THE 


LIFE,  CHARACTER,  AND  WRITINGS 


FRANCIS    LIEBER. 


A    DISCOURSE 


DELIVERED  BEFORE  THE 


HISTORICAL  SOCIETY   OF   PENNSYLVANIA, 


JANUARY  13,  1873. 


BY 

HON.  M.  RUSSELL  THAYEK, 

ASSOCIATE  JUDGE  OF  THE  DISTRICT  COURT  FOR  THE  CITY 
AND  COUNTY  OF   PHILADELPHIA. 


PHILADELPHIA: 

COLLINS,  PRINTER,  705   JAYNE    STREET. 

18T3. 


DISCOUESE. 


IN  a  letter  from  Eome,  dated  June  7, 1822,  Barthold 
George  Niebuhr,  the  historian  of  Rome,  wrote  thus 
to  his  sister-in-law,  Madame  Hensler : — 

"  A  young  man,  Lieber  of  Berlin,  has  arrived  here 
who  went  as  a  volunteer  to  Greece,  and  at  length 
returned,  partly  not  to  die  of  hunger,  partly  because 
the  rascality  of  the  Moreans  and  their  cowardice 
became  insufferable  to  him.  His  veracity  is  beyond 
suspicion  and  his  tales  fill  the  hearer  with  horror.  He 
is  sad  and  melancholy,  because  his  soul  is  very  noble. 
He  interests  and  touches  us  much,  and  we  try  to  cheer 
him  by  kindness.  He  belongs  to  the  youth  of  the 
beautiful  time  of  1813,  when  he  fought  and  was  se 
verely  wounded.  He  is  now  here  without  a  cent.  I 
shall  help  him  at  any  rate."1  The  young  man,  whose 
arrival  in  Rome  was  thus  noticed,  was  twenty-two 
years  of  age.  Of  a  gentle,  but  brave  and  self-reliant 
nature,  of  studious  habits,  a  philosophical  turn  of 
mind,  and  very  fond  of  books,  he  had  already  experi 
enced  much  of  the  roughest  discipline  of  life.  His 


1  Biographic  Information  (Lebensnacliricliten)  concerning  Barthold 
George  Niebuhr,  from  Letters  by  himself  and  Recollections  of  some  of  his 
intimate  friends.  Vol.  ii.  p.  496,  Hamburg,  1838,  3  vols. 


few  years  had  been  divided  between  the  gymnasium, 
the  university,  the  camp,  and  foreign  lands.  He  was 
yet  to  become  one  of  the  profoundest  and  clearest 
writers  upon  political  science  of  the  present  century, 
one  of  the  chief  ornaments  of  the  world  of  letters, 
the  expounder  of  the  principles  of  civil  liberty,  and 
one  of  the  truly  great  men  of  his  adopted  country. 
In  his  later  years  he  used  to  say  that  his  life  con 
sisted  of  many  geological  layers. 

FKAXCIS  LIEBER,  a  son  of  Frederic  "William 
Lieber,  was  born  on  the  18th  March  1800,  in  a  house 
situated  in  the  Breite  Strasse  of  Berlin — the  same 
street  in  which,  on  his  birth-day  in  1848,  the  chief 
fight  took  place  between  the  King's  troops  and  the 
people.  His  father,  a  man  of  business,  had  lost 
much  of  his  property  during  the  war,  and  having  a 
large  family,  great  economy  was  necessary.  Young 
Lieber  was  brought  up  in  the  most  simple  habits, 
and  accustomed  to  a  hardy  life.  His  childhood  fell 
in  the  momentous  times  of  Napoleon's  gigantic  wars. 
He  once  related  to  me  that  he  well  remembered,  when 
a  child  of  six  years,  sitting  in  the  window  of  his 
father's  house  and  crying  bitterly  as  he  beheld  the 
French  army  marching  into  Berlin  after  the  dis 
astrous  day  of  Jena.  From  his  earliest  school  years 
he  was  an  ardent  student,  and  a  favorite  with  his 
teachers;  always  receiving  excellent  testimonials. 
Some  of  these  he  preserved.  Among  them  that  of 
the  clergyman  who  had  prepared  him  for  confinna- 


tion,  who  spoke  of  his  great  desire  for  instruction, 
and  of  his  earnest  devotion.  At  school  he  was  dis 
tinguished  for  his  love  of  truth  and  justice.  He  was 
fond  of  athletic  exercises,  and  was  a  great  "  Turner" 
under  Jahn.  He  was  an  excellent  swimmer,  an 
accomplishment  of  which  he  afterwards  made  use 
when  he  first  came  to  Boston,  where  he  established 
a  swimming  school.  He  informed  me  that  upon  one 
occasion  he  swam  four  hours  without  resting.  At 
the  age  of  fifteen  his  studies  were  interrupted  by 
the  loud  blast  of  that  trumpet  of  war  which  again 
called  the  youth  of  Germany  to  the  defence  of  the 
homes  which  all  supposed  had  been  rendered  secure 
by  the  victory  of  Leipzic  two  years  before. 

In  his  "Letters  to  a  gentleman  in  Germany,"  repub- 
lished  in  England  under  the  title  of  "  The  Stranger 
in  America,"  Lieber  relates  how,  in  1815,  his  father 
one  day  came  into  the  room  where  he  was  studying 
Loder's  Anatomical  Tables,  and  said  to  him  and  his 
brother,  "  Boys,  clean  your  rifles — Napoleon  is  loose 
again;  he  has  returned  from  Elba."  What  followed 
will  be  best  told  in  his  own  words.  It  is  a  chapter 
not  without  interest  in  the  life  of  a  scholar. 

"My  heart  beat  high  ;  it  was  glorious  news  for  a  boy  of  fifteen, 
who  had  often  heard  with  silent  envy  the  account  of  the  campaigns 
of  1813-14  from  the  lips  of  his  two  brothers,  both  of  whom  had 
marched  in  1813,  in  common  with  most  young  men  of  good  family, 
as  volunteer  riflemen,  and  returned  as  wounded  officers.  One  of 
those,  cured  of  his  wounds,  rejoined  his  regiment ;  another  of  my 
brothers  and  myself  followed  the  call  of  government  to  enter  the 
army  as  volunteers,  though  our  age  would  have  exempted  us  from 
all  obligation. 


Which  regiment  should  we  choose  ?  Of  course  one  which  was 
garrisoned  near  the  enemy's  frontier,  so  that  we  should  be  sure  not 
to  have  a  peaceable  campaign  in  a  distant  reserve.  There  was  a 
regiment  among  the  troops  near  the  frontier  of  France,  which  en 
joyed  a  particularly  high  and  just  reputation  ;  its  name  was  '  Col- 
berg,'  bestowed  in  honor  of  its  valiant  defence  of  the  fortress  of 
Colberg  in  the  year  1806  —  the  only  Prussian  fortified  place  at  that 
wretched  time  which  did  not  surrender  to  the  French.  It  was 
composed  of  brave  and  steady  Pomeranians,  a  short,  broad- 
shouldered,  healthy  race  ;  in  more  than  twenty  '  ranged'  engage 
ments  during  the  campaign  of  1813-14  had  they  shown  themselves 
worthy  of  their  honorable  name.  My  brother  and  myself  selected 
this  regiment.  When  the  day  of  the  enlistment  of  the  volunteers 
arrived,  we  went  to  my  father  and  said  :  '  Well,  then,  we  are  going  ; 
is  it  with  your  consent  ?'  '  Go^to  your  mother,'  he  replied.  We 
went  to  her  ;  our  hearts  were  full,  she  had  suffered  so  much  during 
the  first  campaign.  With  a  half  choked  voice  I  said  ;  'Mother, 
we  are  going  to  be  enrolled  —  shall  we  ?'  She  fell  into  our  arms, 
that  noble  woman,  and  sobbed  aloud.  l  Go  !'  was  all  her  bleed 
ing  heart  allowed  her  to  utter  ;  and,  had  she  been  the  mother  of 
twenty  sons,  she  would  have  sent  them  all.  We  had  to  wait  from 
,  ten  to  one  o'clock  before  we  could  get  a  chance  to  have  our  names 

'  il^YW^  taken  down,  the  throng  was  so  great. 

^AQ^f  In  the  beginning  of  May  we  were  marched  from  Berlin  to  our 
regiment.  My  father  accompanied  us  to  the  place  of  rendezvous. 
When  the  bugle  called  us  to  the  line  we  looked  for  him  to  take  the 
last  leave  ;  he  had  stolen  himself  away.  A  great  many  people 
accompanied  us  out  of  the  city  ;  the  beautiful  Brandenburg  gate 
was  soon  behind  us  ;  we  began  to  sing.  I  looked  but  forward, 
happy  that  it  was  now  my  lot  to  bear  arms  in  defence  of  my 
country.  On  the  16th  we  crossed  the  Rhine  ;  on  the  25th  of  May 
we  passed  in  review  before  Prince  Blucher  in  Namur.  On  the 
26th  we  marched  to  a  village  called  Yoistin  and  incorporated 
with  our  regiment.  On  the  3d  of  June  we  had  our  first  parade 
with  the  regiment,  and  the  colonel  declared  that  we  had  the  bear 
ing  of  old  soldiers  ;  he  was  satisfied  with  us.  We  longed  to  be 
put  to  the  test.  I  saw  on  that  day,  for  the  first  time,  the  woman 
who  was  a  sergeant  in  our  regiment,  and  distinguished  herself  so 
much  that  she  could  boast  of  three  orders  on  her  gown  when, 
after  the  peace,  she  was  married  in  Berlin  to  another  sergeant.  In 
a  second  regiment  of  our  brigade  was  another  girl  serving  as  a 


ry  (]&, 
' 


,  ^ 


soldier,  but  she  was  very  different  from  our  sergeant.  Her  sex 
was  discovered  by  mere  accident;  she  had  marched  instead  of  her 
brother,  that  he  might  support  their  aged  parents. 

We  marched  to  Longueville,  seven  leagues  from  Brussels.  On 
the  9th  we  received  lead  to  cast  our  balls ;  the  rifles  being  of 
different  calibres,  for  each  man  had  equipped  himself.  It  is  one 
of  the  most  peculiar  situations  a  man  of  reflecting  mind  can  be 
in,  when  he  casts  his  bullets  for  battle  near  at  hand.  In  the 
evening  I  was  lying  with  two  comrades,  one  of  whom  was  a  Jew, 
in  a  hay-loft;  the  crazy  roof  allowed  us  to  see  the  brilliant  stars. 
We  spoke  of  home.  'My  father,'  said  one,  'told  me  he  was  sure 
he  would  never  see  me  again,  though  he  never  tried  to  keep  me — 
I  feel  as  if  I  should  fall.'  A  ball  entered  his  forehead  in  the  first 
battle  and  killed  him  on  the  spot.  The  second,  the  Jew,  said, 
'Nobody  has  foretold  my  death,  yet  I  believe  I  shall  remain  on 
the  field.'  He  fell  at  my  side,  in  the  battle  of  Ligny,  before  he 
had  fired  a  shot — the  ball  cutting  his  throat.  'And  I,'  said  I, 
'shall  be  brushed,  but  I  think  I  shall  return  home,  though  with  a 
scratched  skin.'  Thus  strangel}'  every  prophecy  of  that  night 
was  fulfilled. 

On  the  morning  of  the  15th  the  generale  was  beaten.  Hos 
tilities  had  begun  on  the  14th.  We  marched  the  whole  day  and 
the  whole  night;  in  the  morning  we  arrived  not  far  from  the 
battle-field  of  Ligny,  and  halted.  Before  us  was  a  rising  ground 
on  which  we  saw  innumerable  troops  ascending  from  the  plain, 
with  flying  colors  and  music  pla}dng.  It  was  a  sight  a  soldier 
likes  to  look  at.  I  cannot  sa}^  with  Napoleon,  that  the  earth 
seemed  proud  to  carry  so  many  brave  men;  but  we  were  proud 
to  belong  to  these  brave  and  calm  masses.  Orders  for  charging 
were  given  ;  the  pressure  of  the  coming  battle  was  felt  more  and 
more.  Some  soldiers,  who  carried  cards  in  their  knapsacks, 
threw  them  away,  believing  that  they  bring  bad  luck.  I  had 
never  plaj^ed  cards  and  carried  none;  but  this  poor  instance  of 
timid  superstition  disgusted  me  so  that  I  purposely  picked  up  a 
pack  and  put  it  in  my  knapsack.  Our  whole  company  consisted 
of  very  young  men,  nearly  all  lads  who  were  impatient  for  battle, 
and  asking  a  thousand  questions,  in  their  excitement,  of  the  old, 
well-seasoned  sergeant-major,  who  had  been  given  to  us  from  the 
regiment.  His  imperturbable  calmness,  which  neither  betrayed 
fear  nor  excited  courage,  but  took  the  battle  like  a  muster, 
amused  us  much. 


8 

We  now  marched  again  up  the  sloping  plain,  and  by  one  o'clock 
in  the  afternoon  arrived  on  the  battle-ground.  Fortune  held  us 
first  on  a  harassing  reserve;  the  French  field-pieces  played  hard 
upon  us,  shells  fell  around  us  and  took  several  men  out  of  our 
column.  We  were  commanded  to  lie  down,  and  I  piqued  myself 
on  making  no  motion  when  balls  or  shells  were  flying  over  us. 
Behind  us  stood  some  cavalry.  One  of  their  officers  had  been  a 
near  neighbor  to  us  in  Berlin  ;  he  rode  up  to  me  and  asked  me  to 
write  home  should  he  fall;  he  would  do  as  much  for  me  should  I 
be  shot  down.  He  soon  after  fell.  We  longed  most  heartily  to 
be  led  into  the  fire,  when  our  officer,  a  well-tried  soldier,  spoke 
these  few  words  :  'My  friends,  it  is  easier  to  fight  than  to  stand 
inactive  exposed  to  fire.  You  are  tried  first  by  the  severest  test; 
show,  then,  that  you  can  be  as  calm  as  the  oldest  soldiers.  My 
honor  depends  upon  your  conduct.  Look  at  me,  and  I  promise 
37ou  shall  not  have  a  bad  example.'  At  length,  about  two  o'clock, 
our  column  was  ordered  to  drive  the  enemy  out  of  the  left  side  of 
the  village.  Our  colonel  rode  up  to  us  and  said,  'Riflemen,  you 
are  young,  I  am  afraid  too  ardent;  calmness  makes  the  soldier; 
hold  3'ourselves  in  order.'  Then  he  turned  around.  'March!' 
and  the  dull,  half-muffled  drum  from  within  the  deep  column  was 
heard  beating  delicious  miisic.  When  the  bugle  gave  the  signal 
to  halt  we  were  in  front  of  the  village  of  Ligny.  The  signal  was 
then  given  for  the  riflemen  to  march  out  to  right  and  left  of  the 
column,  and  to  attack.  Our  ardor  now  led  us  entirely  beyond 
proper  limits;  the  section  to  which  I  belonged  ran  madly,  with 
out  firing,  toward  the  enemy  who  retreated.  My '  hindman'  fell; 
I  rushed  on,  hearing  well  but  not  heeding  the  urgent  calls  of  our 
old  sergeant.  The  village  was  intersected  with  thick  hedges  from 
behind  which  the  grenadiers  fired  upon  us;  but  we  drove  them 
from  one  to  the  other.  I,  forgetting  altogether  to  fire,  and  what 
I  ought  to  have  done,  tore  the  red  plume  from  one  of  the  grena 
dier  bear-caps,  and  swinging  it  over  my  head,  called  triumphantly 
to  my  comrades.  At  length  we  arrived  at  a  road  crossing  the 

•*  w  O 

village  lengthwise,  and  the  sergeant-major  had  now  succeeded  in 
his  attempt  to  bring  us  somewhat  back  to  our  reason.  There  was 
a  house,  around  the  corner,  of  which  he  suspected  that  a  number 
of  French  lay.  '  Be  cautious,'  said  he  to  me,  '  until  the  others 
are  up;'  but  I  stepped  round  where  a  grenadier  stood,  about 
fifteen  paces  from  me;  he  aimed  at  me.  My  antagonist's  ball 


9 

grazed  my  hair  on  the  right  side;  I  shot  and  he  fell.     This  was 
my  first  shot  fired  in  battle. 

Of  our  whole  company,  which,  on  entering  the  engagement, 
numbered  about  one  hundred  and  fifty  strong,  at  night  only 
twenty  or  thirty  combatants  remained.  The  old  soldiers  of  our 
regiment  treated  us  ever,  after  this  battle,  with  signal  regard, 
while  before  it  they  had  looked  upon  us  as  beardless  boys.  We 
marched  all  night.  It  rained  the  whole  of  the  17th,  but  we 
marched  a  great  part  of  that  night  also.  Rain  fell  in  torrents, 
and  the  roads  were  very  bad.  Early  in  the  morning  of  the  18th 
we  found  part  of  our  regiment,  from  which  we  had  been  separated. 
Our  men  were  exhausted,  but  old  Blucher  allowed  us  no  rest. 
As  we  passed  the  Marshal,  wrapped  up  in  a  cloak  and  leaning 
against  a  mound,  our  soldiers  began  to  hurrah.  '  Be  quiet,  my 
lads,'  said  he,  'hold  your  tongues;  time  enough  after  the  victory 
is  gained."  We  entered  the  battle  of  Waterloo  with  Blucher,  in 
the  afternoon  ;  you  know  the  history  of  that  memorable  day. 

The  great  body  of  the  Prussian  and  English  armies  marched 
toward  Paris;  but  half  our  army  corps,  to  which  I  belonged, 
received  orders  to  pursue  Yandamere,  who  had  thrown  himself 
into  Namur.  We  marched  the  whole  of  the  19th;  the  heat  was 
excessive,  and  our  exhaustion  and  thirst  so  great  that  two  men 
of  our  regiment  became  deranged  in  consequence.  At  four  in  the 
afternoon  we  went  to  bivouac;  we  started  early  again,  and  now 
my  strength  forsook  me,  I  could  not  keep  up  with  the  troops,  and 
began  to  lag  behind.  Suddenly,  at  about  noon,  I  heard  the  first 
guns.  The  battle  of  Namur  had  begun.  When  I  arrived  where 
my  regiment  stood,  or,  as  I  should  rather  say,  the  little  band 
representing  it,  I  dropped  down ;  but  fortunately  one  of  my 
comrades  had  some  eggs,  one  of  which  gave  me  great  strength. 
Our  colonel  came  up  to  us,  saying:  'Riflemen,  you  have  twice 
fought  like  the  oldest  soldiers — I  have  no  more  to  say.  This 
woods  is  to  be  cleared;  be  steady — bugleman,  the  signal!'  and 
off  we  went  with  a  great  hurrah !  driving  the  French  before  us 
down  a  hill  toward  Namur,  which  lay  on  our  front.  When  I  saw 
our  men  rushing  too  fast  down  the  hill,  I  was  afraid  that  some 
enemies  might  be  hid  under  the  precipice  to  receive  them.  Hold 
ing  myself  with  my  left  hand  by  a  tree,  I  looked  over  the  preci 
pice  and  saw  about  seven  Frenchmen.  'They  will  hit  me,'  I 
thought,  and,  turning  around  to  call  to  our  soldiers,  I  suddenly 
experienced  a  sensation  as  if  my  whole  body  were  compressed  in 
2 


10 

my  head,  and  this,  like  a  ball,  were  quivering  in  the  ear.  I  could 
feel  the  existence  of  nothing  else ;  it  was  a  most  painful  sensation. 
After  some  time  I  was  able  to  open  my  eyes,  or  to  see  again  with 
them.  I  found  myself  on  the  ground ;  over  me  stood  a  soldier 
firing  at  the  enemy.  I  strained  every  nerve  to  ask,  though  in 
broken  accents,  whether  and  if  so  where  I  was  wounded!  'You 
are  shot  through  the  neck.'  I  begged  him  to  shoot  me;  the  idea 
of  dying  miserably,  half  of  hunger,  half  of  my  wound,  alone  in 
the  wood,  overpowered  me.  He,  of  course,  refused,  spoke  a  word 
of  comfort  that  perhaps  I  might  yet  be  saved,  and  soon  after 
himself  received  a  shot  through  both  knees,  in  consequence  of 
which  he  died  in  the  hospital,  while  I  am  writing  an  account  of 
his  sufferings  here  in  America.  My  thirst  was  beyond  descrip 
tion  ;  it  was  a  feverish  burning.  I  thought  I  should  die,  and 
prayed  for  forgiveness  of  my  sins  as  I  forgave  all.  I  recollect 
I  prayed  for  Napoleon,  and  begged  the  dispenser  of  all  blessings 
to  shower  His  bounty  upon  all  my  beloved  ones,  and  if  it  could 
be,  to  grant  me  a  speedy  end  of  my  sufferings.  I  received  a 
second  ball,  which,  entering  my  chest,  gave  me  more  local  pain 
than  the  first;  I  thought  God  had  granted  my  fervent  prayer.  I 
perceived,  as  I  supposed,  that  the  ball  had  pierced  my  lungs,  and 
tried  to  breathe  hard  to  hasten  my  death.  A  week  afterward, 
while  I  lay  ill  with  my  two  wounds,  in  a  house  at  Liege,  one  of 
my  brothers  was  in  the  hospital  at  Brussels,  and  another  at  Aix- 
la-Chapelle — we  were  just  distributed  at  the  points  of  a  triangle." 

At  the  close  of  the  "Waterloo  campaign,  as  soon  as 
he  was  recovered  from  his  wounds  Lieber  returned 
to  his  studies,  and  joined  the  Berlin  Gymnasium. 
These  gymnasia  had  been  established  by  Dr.  Jahn 
during  the  French  dominion,  in  order  to  impart 
physical  vigor  and  with  it  moral  energy  to  the 
German  youth,  after  the  pedantic  period  of  wigs  and 
queues,  so  as  to  make  them  fit  at  a  later  period  to 
bear  arms.  The  gymnasia  became  therefore  in  a 
manner  patriotic  schools.  After  the  downfall  of 
Napoleon  they  naturally  became  schools  of  liberal 


11 

sentiments — of  civil  freedom.  Jahn  and  many  others 
were  arrested  as  suspected  persons,  and  because 
young  Lieber  was  considered  his  favorite  pupil  he 
too  was  arrested.  He  now  became  an  author,  but 
malgre  lui,  for  the  government  published  several 
songs  of  liberty  which  were  found  among  his  papers, 
to  prove  how  dangerous  a  person  this  lad  was.  He 
was  detained  in  prison  several  months,  beguiling  the 
tediousness  of  his  confinement  by  diligent  study  and 
reading.  Upon  his  discharge  from  prison  without 
a  trial,  he  was  told  that  although  the  charges  against 
him  had  not  been  proved,  he  was  nevertheless  pro 
hibited  from  studying  at  the  Prussian  universities. 
He  consequently  went  to  Jena,  where  he  took  his 
degrees  in  1820.  To  those  who  were  acquainted 
with  Lieber,  and  who  knew  the  intense  love  of 
liberty  which  animated  his  soul,  and  the  scorn  in 
which  he  held  all  systems  which  deprive  man  of 
w^hat  he  believed  to  be  by  nature  the  birthright  of 
all,  and  the  hatred  which  he  felt  for  despotic  power 
whether  proceeding  from  royal  prerogative  or  demo 
cratic  absolutism — a  phrase  which  he  himself  in 
vented — his  imprisonment  by  the  Prussian  govern 
ment  of  that  day,  will  not  appear  remarkable.  At 
that  very  time  he  maintained,  in  opposition  to  his 
republican  friends,  that  German  unity  was  the  first 
of  needs  for  Germany,  and  that  it  would  be  obtained 
only  by  a  revolutionary  king  or  kaiser.  "Writing 
nearly  fifty  years  afterwards  [in  1868],  he  says  :  "  I 
have  this  very  moment  read  in  the  German  papers, 


12 

that  Bismarck  said  in  the  chamber  the  very  thing  for 
which  we  were  hunted  down  in  1820  and  1821." 
"No  man  could  be  more  deeply  impressed  than  was 
Francis  Lieber  with  the  truth  of  that  saying  of 
Aristotle  "The  fellest  of  things  is  armed  injustice." 
In  1820  permission  was  granted  him  to  study  at 
Halle,  but  with  the  intimation  that  he  never  could 
expect  public  employment.  Although  he  lived  in 
a  very  retired  manner,  devoted  to  his  books,  and 
taking  no  part  whatever  in  political  movements,  he 
remained  under  the  surveillance  of  the  police  and 
subject  to  constant  annoyance  from  them.  His  posi 
tion  became  so  irksome  that  he  at  length  took  refuge 
in  Dresden.  While  living  there,  not  unwatched,  the 
Greek  revolution  broke  out.  *  He  instantly  resolved 
to  abandon  his  country  and  to  take  part  in  the  war 
of  independence.  It  was  impossible  for  him  to 
obtain  a  passport  for  any  length  of  time,  and  par 
ticularly  for  a  journey  to  France,  yet  he  had  to  make 
his  way  to  Marseilles  where  he  intended  to  embark 
for  Greece.  He  took,  therefore,  a  passport  for  a 
journey  to  Nuremburg,  and  for  the  short  period  of  a 
fortnight  only.  Once  in  possession  of  it,  he  emptied 
an  inkstand  over  the  words  which  declared  it  to  be 
limited  to  so  short  a  space  of  time.  He  then  had  it 
signed  in  every  small  place  on  his  route  to  !NTurem- 
burg,  so  that,  to  use  his  own  words,  "it  finally 
looked  formidable  enough."  Arrived  in  Nurem- 
burg,  he  accounted  for  the  defacing  ink-blot  by  the 
awkwardness  of  a  police  officer,  and  had  the  paper 


13 

signed  for  Munich.  There  he  chose  a  time  when  the 
chief  officer  of  the  legation  had  gone  to  dinner,  and 
had  it  further  signed  for  Switzerland,  pretending  to 
be  in  a  great  hurry.  He  travelled  on  foot  through 
Switzerland,  and  thence  to  Marseilles.  In  this 
manner  and  by  such  shifts  did  this  great  historical 
scholar,  this  profound  writer  upon  the  laws  of 
nations,  this  great  philosopher  who  explained  and 
illustrated  the  nature  of  civil  government  and  the 
origin  and  meaning  of  laws,  whose  works  have  been 
of  incalculable  benefit  to  liberty  and  have  added  so 
many  new  ideas  to  political  science,  escape  from  his 
native  land! 

The  enthusiasm  which  led  him  to  volunteer  in  the 
cause  of  Grecian  independence  met  with  a  severe 
disappointment.  The  history  of  that  brief  and 
unfortunate  struggle  is  well  known.  His  own  ex 
perience  is  vividly  portrayed  in  his  Journal  in  Greece 
written  in  Rome,  and  published  at  Leipzic  in  1823, 
and  republished  at  Amsterdam  in  the  same  year 
under  the  title  of  "The  German  Anacharsis."  After 
suffering  great  hardships  he  embarked  at  Messa- 
longhi  in  1822  in  a  small  vessel  bound  for  Ancona. 
One  scudo  and  a  half  was  all  that  remained  in  his 
purse  after  paying  the  price  of  his  passage.  From 
Ancona  his  desire  to  see  Rome  induced  him  to  make 
his  way  to  that  city,  which  he  had  much  difficulty  in 
reaching  and  entering,  owing  to  the  great  gap  in  his 
passport.  He  has  himself  related  how  he  entered  by 
stealth  the  Porta  del  Populo,  as  if  the  porches  of  the 


14 

churches  near  it  and  the  obelisk  were  nothing  new  to 
him,  and  how  his  heart  beat  as  he  approached  the 
tame-looking  sentinel  of  the  Papal  troops,  more  than 
it  ever  had  beaten  at  the  approach  of  any  grenadier 
of  the  enemy,  and  the  indescribable  delight  he  felt 
when  he  had  safely  passed  him,  and  felt  and  saw  that 
he  was  in  Rome.  In  Rome  he  found  a  friend  who 
shared  his  room  with  him ;  but  he  could  not  reside  in 
Rome  for  any  length  of  time  without  having  permis 
sion  to  do  so  from  the  police,  and  that  he  could  not 
obtain  without  a  certificate  from  the  minister  of  his 
country  that  his  passport  was  in  order.  The  very 
contrary  was  the  case.  In  fact,  he  was  ashamed  to 
show  his  passport  at  the  Prussian  legation.  He 
resolved,  therefore,  to  disclose  frankly  his  situation 
to  Mr.  Niebuhr,  the  Prussian  ambassador  to  the 
Papal  See,  "  hoping,"  as  he  said,  "that  a  scholar  who 
had  written  the  history  of  Rome  could  not  be  so 
cruel  as  to  drive  him  from  Rome  without  allowing 
him  time  to  see  and  study  it."  The  Prussian  am 
bassador  resided  at  the  Palazzo  Orsini,  or,  as  it  is 
frequently  called,  Teatro  di  Marcello,  for  the  palace 
is  on  and  within  the  remains  of  the  theatre  which 
Augustus  built  and  dedicated  to  his  nephew  Marcel- 
lus.  "My  heart,"  says  Lieber,  "grew  heavier  the 
nearer  I  approached  this  venerable  pile  to  which  a 
whole  history  is  attached,  from  the  times  of  an 
tiquity,  through  the  middle  ages  when  it  served  as 
a  castle  for  its  proud  inmates,  and  down  to  the 
most  recent  times.  The  idea  that  I  might  be  dis- 


15 

believed,  prevented  me  for  a  moment  from  proceed 
ing  any  farther  toward  that  building  under  an 
engraving  of  which  in  my  possession  I  find  that  I 
afterwards  wrote  these  words,  '  In  questa  rovina 
retrovai  la  vita.7 ' 

Of  his  reception  by  Niebuhr  he  has  left  a  most 
interesting  account. 

"He  received  me,"  says  he,  "with  kindness  and  affability,  re 
turned  with  me  to  his  room,  made  me  relate  my  whole  story,  and 
appeared  much  pleased  that  I  could  give  him  some  information  re 
specting  Greece,  which  seemed  to  be  not  void  of  interest  to  him. 
The  conversation  lasted  several  hours,  when  he  broke  off  asking 
me  to  return  to  dinner.  I  hesitated  in  accepting  the  invitation, 
which  he  seemed  unable  to  understand.  When  I  saw  that  my 
motive  for  declining  so  flattering  an  invitation  was  not  under 
stood,  I  said,  throwing  a  glance  at  my  dress, ;  Realty,  sir,  I  am  not 
in  a  state  to  dine  with  an  excellency.'  He  stamped  with  his 
foot  and  said  with  some  animation,  'Are  diplomatists  always  be 
lieved  to  be  so  cold  hearted  ?  I  am  the  same  that  I  was  in  Berlin 
when  I  delivered  my  lectures.  Your  remark  was  wrong.'  No 
argument  could  be  urged  against  such  reasons.  I  recollect  that 
dinner  with  delight.  His  conversation  abounding  in  rich  and 
various  knowledge  and  striking  observations,  his  great  kindness, 
the  acquaintance  I  made  with  Mrs.  Niebuhr,  his  lovely  children 
who  were  so  beautiful  that  when  at  a  later  period  I  used  to  walk 
with  them,  the  women  would  exclaim,  '  Ma  guardate,  guardate,  che 
Angeli  /'  A  good  dinner,  which  I  had  not  enjoyed  for  a  long  time, 
in  a  high  vaulted  room,  the  ceiling  of  which  was  painted  in  the 
style  of  Italian  palaces,  a  picture  by  the  mild  Francia  close  by, 
the  sound  of  the  murmuring  fountain  in  the  garden,  and  the  re 
freshing  beverages  in  coolers  which  I  had  seen  but  the  day  before 
represented  in  some  of  the  most  masterly  pictures  of  the  Italian 
school — in  short  my  consciousness  of  being  at  dinner  with  Me- 
buhr  in  his  house  in  Rome — and  all  this  in  such  bold  relief  to  my 
late  and  not  unfrequently  disgusting  sufferings,  would  have  rcn. 
dered  the  moment  one  of  almost  perfect  enjoyment  and  happiness, 
had  it  not  been  for  an  annoyance  which  I  have  no  doubt  will  ap 
pear  here  a  mere  trifle.  My  dress  consisted  as  yet  of  nothing 


better  than  a  pair  of  unblacked  shoes,  such  as  are  not  (infrequent 
ly  worn  in  the  Levant ;  a  pair  of  socks  of  coarse  Greek  wool,  the 
brownish  pantaloons  frequently  worn  by  sea-captains  in  the  Medi 
terranean,  and  a  blue  frock  coat  through  which  two  balls  had 
passed,  a  fate  to  which  the  blue  cloth  cap  had  likewise  been  ex 
posed.  The  socks  were  exceedingly  short,  hardly  covering  my 
ankles  and  so  indeed  were  the  pantaloons,  so  that  when  I  was  in 
a  sitting  position  they  refused  me  the  charity  of  meeting,  with  the 
obstinacy  which  reminded  me  of  the  irreconcilable  temper  of  the 
two  brothers  in  Schiller's  Bride  of  Messina.  There  happened  to 
dine  with  Mr.  Niebuhr  another  lady  besides  Mrs.  Niebuhr,  and 
m%y  embarrassment  was  not  small  when  towards  the  conclusion  of 
the  dinner  the  children  rose  and  played  about  on  the  ground,  and 
I  saw  my  poor  extremities  exposed  to  all  the  frank  remarks  of 
quick-sighted  children,  fearing  as  I  did  at  the  same  time  the  still 
more  trying  moments  after  dinner  when  I  should  be  obliged  to 
take  coffee  near  the  ladies,  unprotected  by  the  kindly  shelter  of  the 
table.  Mr.  Niebuhr  observed,  perhaps,  that  something  embarrassed 
me  and  redoubled  if  possible  his  kindness.  After  dinner  he  pro 
posed  a  walk  and  asked  the  ladies  to  accompany  us.  I  pitied 
them,  but  as  a  gentleman  of  their  acquaintance  had  dropped  in 
by  this  time,  who  gladly  accepted  the  offer  to  walk  with  us,  they 
were  spared  the  mortification  of  taking  my  arm.  Mr.  Niebuhr 
probably  remembering  what  I  had  said  of  my  own  appearance  in 
the  morning,  put  his  arm  under  mine  and  thus  walked  with  me  a 
long  time.  After  our  return,  when  I  intended  to  take  leave,  he 
asked  me  whether  I  wished  for  anything.  I  said  I  should  like  to 
borrow  his  history.  He  said  he  would  get  a  copy  for  me.  As  to 
his  other  books,  he  gave  me  the  key  of  his  library  to  take  what 
ever  I  liked.  He  laughed  when  I  returned  laden  with  books,  and 
dismissed  me  in  the  kindest  manner." 

Very  soon  afterwards  Niebuhr  invited  young  Lie- 
ber  to  live  with  him,  assisting  him,  if  agreeable  to 
him,  in  the  education  of  his  son  Marcus.  The  invita 
tion  was  accepted,  and  Lieber  passed  a  year  of  un 
alloyed  happiness  in  Rome,  living  in  the  family  of  the 
historian,  sharing  his  confidence  and  affection,  the 
daily  companion  of  his  walks,  and  of  his  conversation, 


17 

pursuing  all  the  while  his  studies  and  storing  his 
mind  with  the  treasures  of  Roman  antiquity  and  art. 
In  the  spring  of  1823,  when  Niebuhr  quitted  the 
embassy  at  Rome,  he  took  Lieber  with  him  to  Naples 
whence  they  returned  to  Rome.  Thence  they  went 
by  the  way  of  Florence,  Pisa,  and  Bologna,  to  the 
Tyrol,  and  in  Innspruck  Lieber  took  leave  of  that 
family  in  the  bosom  of  which  he  had  passed  so  many 
days  of  happiness.  Niebuhr  died  in  January  1831. 
Long  afterwards,  in  his  new  home  across  the  ocean 
on  the  banks  of  the  Congaree,  the  great  publicist 
embalmed  his  love  and  gratitude  to  Nlebuhr  in  that 
beautiful  and  imperishable  record  which  contains  his 
reminiscences  of  the  friend  of  his  youth.  In  his 
dedication  of  the  volume  to  his  friend,  Mrs.  Austin  of 
London,  he  says  "I  could  not  have  graced  with  your 
name  any  pages  dearer  to  me,  though  painfully  dear 
I  own — leaves  written  in  the  greatest  of  cities,  and 
under  the  roof  of  my  best  friend,  now  perused  in 
distant  America,  he  dead  and  I  in  exile.  I  felt  as  if 
I  walked  through  an  Italian  garden,  charming  in 
deed  with  perfuming  flowers  and  lovely  alleys  and 
fountains,  with  the  luxuriant  trees  of  the  south  in 
blossom,  the  fragrant  orange  and  the  glowing  pome 
granate,  and  with  vistas  far  and  wide  to  the  distant 
deep  blue  mountains.  But  I  felt  too  as  if  I  walked 
alone  in  it.  With  all  these  joyous  colors  of  bright 
spring  around  me  and  the  cloudless  azure  vault 
above  me,  I  felt  the  grief  of  loneliness,  and  every 
spot  reminded  me  of  him  and  what  I  owe  him."  The 

3 


18 

"  Beminiscences  of  ISTiebuhr"  was  republished  in 
England  by  Bentley,  and  translated  into  German  by 
the  son  of  Hugo,  the  civilian. 

When  Lieber  was  in  Rome  with  Niebuhr,  the 
King  of  Prussia,  visiting  that  city  after  the  congress 
of  "Verona,  saw  him  there,  and  promised  Niebtthr 
that  if  Lieber  desired  to  return  to  Prussia  he  should 
not  be  molested.  From  Innspruck  he  therefore  re 
turned  to  Prussia,  but  he  had  hardly  arrived  in  Berlin 
before  he  was  again  arrested  upon  the  old  charges  of 
enmity  to  the  government,  entertaining  republican 
sentiments  and  belonging  to  a  secret  association : 
and  he  was  cast  into  the  State  prison  of  Koepnick. 
On  the  22d  March  1823  Niebuhr  writes  :  "  It  has 
been  said  that  Lieber  was  to  be  released  on  his 
father's  birthday,  but  nothing  has  come  of  it.  Such 
carelessness  in  leaving  a  good  man  to  languish  in 
fetters  makes  me  indignant,  though  no  cruelty  is 
intended."  And  again  :  "  April  6th,  I  visited  poor 
Lieber  yesterday  in  the  Bastile  of  Koepnick.  Oh 
my  God !"  He  was  at  length,  after  some  months 
liberated  through  Niebuhr's  pressing  solicitations,  a 
kindness  which  was  the  greater  as  Niebuhr's  own 
political  sentiments  were  regarded  with  some  suspi 
cion  by  the  men  in  power.  While  at  Koepnick  he 
wrote  a  little  volume  of  poems,  "  Wein  und  Wonne 
Lieder,"  which  was  published  at  Berlin  under  the 
name  of  Arnold  Franz.  Fearing  renewed  persecu 
tion  he  took  refuge  in  England.  He  arrived  in  Lon 
don  in  1825,  where  he  resided  for  a  year,  writing  for 


19 

German  periodicals  and  giving  lessons  in  the  lan 
guages  for  his  support.  He  always  said  it  was  the 
hardest  time  of  his  life  "  doing  uncongenial  work, 
and  physically  laboring  like  an  American  army 
mule." 

In  1827  he  came  to  the  United  States  with  warm 
recommendations  from  Niebuhr,  whose  letters  show 
his  great  estimation  and  affection  for  his  young 
friend,  and  from  other  eminent  men.  In  a  letter  Sept. 
13,  1827,  Niebuhr  wrote  to  him:  "I  approve  of 
your  resolution  to  go  to  America  so  entirely  that,  had 
you  been  able  to  ask  my  advice  beforehand,  I  should 
have  unqualifiedly  urged  you  tofgo.  Only  beware 
that  you  do  not  fall  into  an  idolatry  of  the  country 
and  that  state  of  things  which  is  so  dazzling  because 
it  shows  the  material  world  in  so  favorable  a  light. 
Remain  a  German,  and  without  counting  hour  and 
day,  yet  say  to  yourself  that  the  hour  and  day  will 
come  when  you  will  be  able  to  come."  He  also 
advised  him,  perceiving,  no  doubt,  the  bent  of  his 
mind,  to  write  no  political  dissertations,  and  closed 
his  letter  with  these  words,  "  the  paper  is  filled  to  the 
margin  and  therefore  I  can  only  add  God  bless  you. 
My  wife  and  children  send  their  love.  Marcus  thinks 
and  speaks  of  { you  as  if  we  had  left  Rome  but  a  few 
weeks  ago."  \  Bivt^notwithstanding  his  reverence^ 
and  affection  for  his  friend,  Lieber  did  not  obey  his 
injunctions  in  the  two  particulars  in  regard  to  which 
he  had  been  most  emphatic  in  his  advice.  He  be-  \ 
came  an  American  citizen  at  the  earliest  possible 


20 

moment  when  the  law  would  permit  him  to  do  so,  and 
his  great  and  enduring  fame  rests  upon  his  political 
writings;  not,  I  need  hardly  say,  upon  fugitive  dis 
sertations  upon  the  politics  of  the  day — that  most 
ephemeral  of  all  literature,  but  upon  those  masterly 
and  laborious  works  upon  political  science,  which  are 
a  vast  and  rich  mine  of  thought  upon  the  subjects 
of  which  they  treat,  while  the  learning,  originality, 
and  power  which  distinguish  them  have  made  them 
an  authority  in  all  lands  and  before  all  tribunals.  ") 

He  arrived  at  New  York  June  20,  1827,  and  pro 
ceeded  to  Boston,  where  he  took  up  his  residence. 
There  he  commenced  his  laborious  work,  "  The  Ency 
clopedia  Americana,"  in  thirteen  volumes,  in  which 
he  was  employed  five  years.  During  this  time  he 
also  prepared,  with  the  assistance  of  his  wife,  and 
published  the  translation  of  a  French  work  on  the 
Revolution  of  1830,  and  a  German  work  on  Casper 
Hauser  by  Feuerbach.  He  always  looked  back  with 
pleasure  to  his  residence  in  Boston,  where  he  num 
bered  among  his  most  highly  esteemed  and  intimate 
friends  Story,  Pickering,  Channing,  Sullivan,  Tick- 
nor,  Prescott,  and  many  other  distinguished  men. 
In  1832  he  removed  to  New  York,  where  he  pub 
lished  a  translation  of  De  Beaumont  and  De  Tocque- 
ville's  work  on  the  Penitentiary  System,  with  an 
introduction  and  many  notes  which  were  in  turn 
translated  in  Germany.  "While  in  New  York  he 
received  from  the  trustees  of  Girard  College,  at  the 
head  of  whom  was  Nicholas  Biddle,  the  honorable 


21 

commission  of  preparing  a  plan  of  education  and 
instruction  for  that  institution.  This  brought  him  to 
Philadelphia  in  1833,  where  he  remained  about  two 
years,  and  where  was  published,  besides  his  plan  of 
education,  "Letters  to  a  Gentleman  in  Germany." 
He  employed  himself  also  at  this  time  in  writing  a 
supplement  to  his  Encyclopedia,  but,  owing  to  the 
deranged  condition  of  the  monetary  affairs  of  the 
country  resulting  from  General  Jackson's  war  upon 
the  United  States  Bank,  the  supplement  was  not 
continued.  In  Philadelphia  he  made  many  valued 
friends  who  remember  with  delight  the  charms  of  his 
society  and  the  singular  fascination  of  his  conversa 
tion,  so  replete  with  instruction,  so  full  of  experience 
of  the  world  and  of  kno  wledge  of  events  and  of  men, 
and  so  much  brightened  by  the  playfulness  of  a  cheer 
ful  mind  and  the  gayety  of  a  sparkling  wit. 

In  1835  he  was  appointed  to  the  professorship  of 
History  and  Political  Economy  in  South  Carolina 
College.  He  remained  in  that  position,  residing  at 
Columbia,  for  a  period  of  more  than  twenty  years — 
always  highly  honored  by  the  distinguished  men  of 
the  South — and  discharging  the  duties  of  his  chair 
with  great  success  and  a  constantly  increasing  repu 
tation.  Here  he  wrote  and  published  the  great  works 
upon  which  his  fame  will  chiefly  rest ;  the  three 
principal  of  which  are,  his  "Manual  of  Political 
Ethics,"  2  vols.,  published  in  1838;  "Legal  and 
Political  Hermeneutics,  or  the  Principles  of  Interpre- 


22 

tation  and  Construction  in  Law  and  Politics,"  1  vol., 
published  in  1839;  and  his  "Civil  Liberty  and  Self- 
Government,"  2  vols.,  published  in  1853.  It  is  diffi- 
~7^  cult,  within  the  limits  of  such  a  discourse  as  this,  to 
convey  any  adequate  idea  of  the  weight  and  value  of 
these  great  works.  They  were  positive  additions  of 
the  greatest  importance  to  the  knowledge  previously 
possessed  upon  these  subjects.  They  embodied  in  a 
profound,  original,  and  comprehensive  system  the  prin 
ciples  upon  which  human  society  and  government  re 
pose.  They  traced  to  their  true  sources  all  the  social 
and  governmental  relations  and  expounded  their  rea 
sons,  their  history,  their  distinctions,  and  their  philo 
sophic  significance  and  results,  with  a  clearness  of 
exhibition,  a  force  of  argument,  a  wealth  of  learning, 
a  power  of  illustration,  and  a  highi  moral  ^purpose 

never  before  seen  in  the  same  field. /In  his  Eblitical 
g  4^ 

fethics  he  shows  how  the  principles  01  ethics  are  ap 
plicable  to  political  affairs,  by  what  moral  laws  we 
ought  to  be  governed  in  political  cases,  what  con 
science  and  experience  prescribe  for  a  citizen  in  his 
relations  to  government,  the  law,  and  society.  He 
treats  of  the  State,  its  nature,  origin,  objects  and  just 
relations,  of  primordial  and  inalienable  rights,  of  soci 
ety  and  its  sovereignty,  of  true  allegiance,  of  law  and 
its  provinces  and  administration,  of  government  and 
its  powers  and  abuses,  of  constitutions  written  and 
unwritten,  of  crimes  and  their  punishment,  of  indus 
try  and  its  relations  to  the  State,  of  the  reciprocal 


23 

relation  of  rights  and  duties,  of  political  virtue,  of 
wealth  and  poverty  in  its  influence  on  society  and 
states,  of  education,  of  woman  and  her  relations  to 
society,  of  the  press,  of  elections  and  voting,  of  legis 
latures  and  judges,  of  parties  in  the  government,  of 
majorities  and  the  rights  of  minorities,  of  executive 
officers  and  their  duties,  of  jurors,  advocates,  and 
witnesses,  of  war  and  the  duties  of  the  soldier,  of  re 
ligion,  justice,  and  patriotism,  which  he  called  the 
three  pillars  of  society  and  the  State.  Everywhere 
among  learned  and  scientific  men,  this  great  work 
created  a  profound  impression.  Chancellor  Kent  in  \ 
his  Commentaries  commended  it  in  the  strongest  terms 
for  the  excellence  of  its  doctrines  and  its  various 
and  profound  erudition,  and  observed  that  "  when  he 
read  Lieber's  works,  he  always  felt  that  he  had  a  sure 
pilot  on  board,  however  dangerous  the  navigation." 
In  a  letter  to  Lieber,  Judge  Story  said  of  it :  "  It 
contains  by  far  the  fullest  and  most  correct  develop 
ment  of  the  true  theory  of  what  constitutes  the  State 
that  I  have  ever  seen.  It  abounds  with  profound 
views  of  government,  which  are  illustrated  with 
various  learning.  To  me  many  of  the  thoughts  are 
new  and  as  striking  as  they  are  new.  I  do  not  hesi 
tate  to  say  that  it  constitutes  one  of  the  best  theoreti 
cal  treatises  on  the  true  nature  and  objects  of  govern 
ment  which  has  been  produced  in  modern  times,  con 
taining  much  for  instruction,  much  for  admonition, 
and  much  for  deep  meditation,  addressing  itself  to 
the  wise  and  virtuous  of  all  countries.  It  solves  the 


24 

question  what  government  is  best  by  the  answer, 
illustrated  in  a  thousand  ways,  that  it  is  that  which 

*>r       : 

best  promotes  the  substantial  interests  of  the  whole 
people  of  the  nation  upon  which  it  acts.  Such  a  work 
is  peculiarly  important  in  these  times  when  so  many 
false  theories  are  afloat  and  so  many  disturbing  doc 
trines  are  promulgated."  "  It  bears  testimony,"  wrote 
Henry  Hallam,  "to  your  exertions  in  the  great  field 
of  philosophical  jurisprudence."  "  It  is  remarkable," 
wrote  "William  H.  Prescott,  "  that  you  should  have 
brought  together  such  a  variety  of  pertinent  illustra 
tions  from  all  sources,  familiar  as  well  recondite,  by 
which  you  have  given  life  and  a  popular  interest  to 
your  philosophy.  It  is  a  book  so  full  of  suggestion 
that  the  reader  has  done  only  half  his  work  when  he 
has  read  a  chapter,  for  it  puts  him  on  a  train  of  think 
ing  for  himself  which  he  must  carry  on  after  he  has 
closed  the  volume."  In  his  Ferdinand  and  Isabella, 
Mr.  Prescott  declares  of  Lieber's  works,  that  they 
could  not  have  been  produced  before  the  nineteenth 
century.  ""What  strikes  me  particularly,"  wrote 
"William  Kent,  "is  the  vast  range  of  illustration, 
your  writings  have  drawn  from  current  literature, 
contemporaneous  history,  and  a  thousand  sources 
which  after  all  my  conversations  with  you  still  amaze 
me.  It  is  this  faculty  of  yours  to  range  over  all 
things,  great  and  small,  past  and  present,  and  extract 
a  moral,  or  a  rule,  or  a  philosophic  deduction,  '  hived 
like  the  honey  bag  o'  the  bee,'  which  strikes  me  the 
most  in  your  books.  You  would  have  made  a  great 


25 

common-law  lawyer.  The  whole  turn  of  your  mind 
is  that  way,  your  taste  for  English  history  and  prefer 
ence  for  English  liberty,  all  show  your  predominating 
inclination."  "In  my  opinion,"  wrote  Chancellor  Kent 
to  Chancellor  De  Sausure  of  South  Carolina,  "Lieber's 
eminence  as  a  scholar,  in  history,  political  economy, 
ethics,  principles  of  government,  geography,  and 
belles-lettres,  would  elevate  the  reputation  of  any 
university  in  our  country.  His  talents,  his  learning, 
and  great  moral  worth  are  conceded  by  all  his  exten 
sive  acquaintance,  among  whom  are  some  of  the  first 
scholars  and  jurists  in  the  United  States."  By  Eng 
lish  critics  the  Political  Ethics  was  compared  favor 
ably  with  the  great  work  of  Montesquieu  and  re 
garded  as  pre-eminent  among  works  on  political 
science. 

The  "  Legal  and  Political  Hermeneutics,"  which 
followed  the  Political  Ethics,  is  a  most  lucid  treatise 
on  the  principles  and  science  of  interpretation  and 
construction  in  law  and  politics.  It  is  spoken  of  in 
terms  of  the  highest  admiration  by  Professor  Green- 
leaf,  a  very  competent  judge,  who  adds,  in  respect  to 
Lieber's  writings  generally,  "he  always  leaps  into 
the  deepest  water  and  always  comes  up  like  a  good 
swimmer."  Kufus  Choate  wrote,  June  25,  1854,  "  I 
consider  very  few  of  my  cases  prepared  without  dip 
ping  into  you,  and  what  the  Ethics  don't  furnish 
the  Hermeneutics  do."  Lieber's  distinction  between 
interpretation  and  construction  has  been  generally 
adopted  by  legal  writers.  There  was  something  more 

4 


26 


in  these  commendations  of  great  and  learned  men,  it 
is  well  observed  by  a  writer  in  the  Nation,  than  mere 
compliment,  for  "many  of  the  topics  discussed  were 
at  the  time  new,  doubtful,  and  difficult,  and  Lieber 
lived  to  find  conclusions  which  he  had  arrived  at 
and  was  the  first  to  express  thirty  years  ago, 
referred  to  by  writers  of  the  present  day  as  familiar 
political  truths,  without,  perhaps,  any  conception  on 
the  part  of  the  writers,  of  the  source  whence  they 
were  derived." 

But  the  best  known  of  his  productions  is  his  work 
on  "  Civil  Liberty  and  Self-Government."  A  work 
which  Has  received  the  highest  commendation  not 
only  in  this  country,  but  in  Europe  also.  Professor 
Creasy,  of  London,  in  his  "  Eise  and  Progress  of  the 
British  Constitution,"  very  frequently  quotes  from 
it,  adding  the  highest  praise,  while  on  the  continent 
such  publicists  as  Von  Mohl  and  Mittermaier, 
confirm  the  correctness  of  his  judgment.  To  them 
may  be  added  Garelli,  the  eminent  Italian  jurist, 
and  many  other  distinguished  writers  upon  inter 
national  and  public  law.  "Dr.  Lieber,"  says  Pro 
fessor  Creasy,  "  is  the  first  who  has  pointed  out  the 
all-important  principle  of  English  and  American 
liberty,  that  every  officer  remains  individually  re 
sponsible  for  whatever  he  does,  no  matter  whether 
he  acts  under  the  order  of  his  superiors  or  not — a 
principle  wholly  unknown  in  other  countries."  His 
Civil  Liberty  and  Self-Government  was  intended  as 
a  sequel  to  that  portion  of  his  Political  Ethics  which 


, 


^ 


upon  civil  institutions.  He  called  it  "institutional  . 
liberty,"  a  very  happy  and  original  formulation  of 
the  truth  that  political  liberty  is  dependent  upon 
certain  fundamental  institutions  which  are  necessary 
for  its  existence.  In  this  great  work  he  handled  the 
most  difficult  subjects  in  the  most  masterly  manner, 
reasoning  always  with  a  bold  and  independent 
spirit,  animated  with  a  constant  love  of  truth  and 
liberty^  striking  always  heavy  blows  at  every  form 
of  oppression,  and  embellishing  his  argument  with 
a  copiousness  of  illustration  from  history  which 
makes  the  whole  work  attractive  in  the  highest 
degree.  He  treats  of  ancient  and  modern  liberty,  of 
ancient,  medieval,  and  modern  states,  of  national 
independence  and  personal  liberty,  of  the  rights  of 
personal  locomotion,  communion,  emigration,  and 
petition,  of  liberty  of  conscience,  of  property,  of 
the  supremacy  of  law,  of  high  treason,  of  bail  and 
trial,  of  publicity  in  political  affairs,  of  taxation, 
of  division  of  power,  of  responsible  ministers  and 
representative  government,  of  the  independence  of 
the  judiciary,  of  parliamentary  law,  of  the  bi 
cameral  system,  of  institutional  self-government,  of 
the  wealth  and  longevity  of  states,  and  a  hundred 
other  topics  of  like  importance  ;  and  there  is  not  one 
which  he  touches,  upon  which  he  does  not  cast  a 
new  light,  and  which  he  does  not  exhibit  in  a  form 
more  clear  and  attractive  than  that  in  which  such 
subjects  have  been  hitherto  placed.  Mr.  Bancroft 


28 


has  justly  said  of  this  great  work  of  Lieber,  that  "it 
entitles  him  to  the  honors  of  a  defender  of  liberty." 

His  truthful  and  independent  mind  always  pur 
sued  an  even  course,  avoiding  all  pernicious  extremes, 
pandering  to  no  man's  prejudices,  and  fearing  no 
man's  judgment.  He  hated  a  demagogue  if  possi 
ble  more  than  he  hated"  a  tyrant,  and  he  hated  the 
latter  as  an  enemy  of  his  race.  "  The  doctrine  vox 
populi  vox  Dei"  said  he,  "is  essentially  unrepublican, 
as  the  doctrine  that  the  people  may  do  what  they 
list,  under  the  Constitution,  above  the  Constitution, 
(and  against  the  Constitution,  is  an  open  avowal  of 
•  disbelief  in  self-government.  The  true  and  staunch 
!  republican  wants  liberty,  but  no  deification  of  him 
self  or  others.  He  wants  a  firmly  built  self-govern 
ment  and  noble  institutions,  but  no  absolutism  of 
any  sort,  none  to  practise  on  others,  and  none  to 
have  practised  on  himself.  He  is  too  proud  for  the 
vox  populi  vox  Dei.  He  wants  no  divine  right  of  the 
people,  for  he  knows  very  well  that  it  means  nothing 
but  despotic  power  of  insinuating  leaders.  He 
wants  the  real  rule  of  the  people,  that  is,  the  insti 
tutionally  organized  country  which  distinguishes  it 
from  a  mere  mob,  for  a  mob  is  an  unorgaiiic  multi 
tude  with  a  general  impulse  of  action.  Woe  to  the 
country  in  which  political  hypocrisy  first  calls  the 
people  almighty,  then  teaches  that  the  voice  of  the 
people  is  divine,  then  pretends  to  take  clamor  for 
the  true  voice  of  the  people,  and  lastly  gets  up  the 
desired  clamor." 


29 

I  The  influence  of  these  great  works  of  Lieber  upon  I/ 
the  public  mind  of  the  world  has  been  very  great, 
particularly  in  this  country  and  in  England,  while 
the  civilians  and  scholars  of  all  lands  have  borne 
testimony  to  the  originality,  the  genius,  and'  the 
power  which  they  display.  He  had  a  large  and 
comprehensive  mind  which  grasped  a  subject  firmly, 
turned  it  over  and  over,  exmined  it  as  a  whole  and 
in  all  its  details,  and  never  let  it  go  until  under  the 
strong  rays  of  reason,  and  in  the  light  of  the  highest 
morality  and  truth,  its  true  proportions  and  just 
relations  stood  clearly  revealed. 

In  one  of  his  works  he  has  said  that  memory  is 
"the  most  useful  and  indispensable  of  all  instru 
ments  in  all  pursuits."  He  himself  had  a  most 
wonderful  memory.  His  mind  was  a  great  store 
house  where  seemed  to  be  preserved,  ready  for  use,  all 
his  extensive  and  varied  learning — all  that  he  had 
read,  or  heard,  or  witnessed,  in  the  wide  range  of  a 
great  and  multifarious  experience.  Yet  he  was  never 
pedantic.  He  never  quoted  for  mere  ostentation  or 
ornament  of  speech.  He  never  fell  into  the  error 
of  betraying  the  pleasure  which  a  quoting  aujjior 
derives  from  having  overcome  the  difficulty  of  a 
foreign  language.  He  was  perfectly  familiar  with 
Greek  and  Latin,  thoroughly  accomplished  in  all 
classical  learning,  ancient  and  modern,  and  spoke 
and  wrote  most  of  the  languages  of  Europe.  His 
English  is  written  with  as  much  ease  and  purity  as 
if  it  had  been  his  native  tongue.  It  is,  indeed, 


30 

most  remarkable  that,  having  come  to  this  country 
at  the  age  of  twenty-seven,  he  should  so  thoroughly 
have  mastered  the  language  that  his  works  are 
written  in  a  style  which,  for  strength,  vigor,  perspi 
cuity,  exactness  of  expression,  simplicity  and  idio 
matic  accuracy,  might  serve  as  a  model  for  such 
compositions.  In  the  treatment  of  his  subjects  he 
was  eminently  practical.  He  wasted  little  labor 
upon  mere  ornament,  but  every  sentence  was  solid 
and  compact  with  thought. 

He  was  honest  and  conscientious,  intrepid  in  his 
defence  of  truth  and  liberty,  unsparing  in  his  expo 
sure  and  denunciation  of  falsehood  and  tyranny.  He 
loved  to  tear  away  the  mask  which  concealed  per 
nicious  errors,  and  to  reveal  truth  in  all  the  majesty 
and  stately  beauty  which  belongs  to  her.  If  I  were 
asked  to  describe  the  leading  characteristics  of  his 
mind,  I  would  say  that  they  were  an  intense  love  of 
knowledge,  an  intense  love  of  truth,  and  an  intense 
>UV  patriotism.  If  I  were  asked  what  were  his  most 
useful  faculties,  I  would  answer,  his  strong,  reten 
tive  memory,  and  his  broad,  clear,  sagacious 
common  sense  and  solid  judgment.  If  I  were  asked 
what  were  his  most  attractive  personal  qualities,  I 
would  say  the  charming  simplicity  and  candor  of  his 
character,  his  delightful  and  instructive  conversa 
tion,  and  the  quiet,  playful  humor  which  lighted  up 
and  animated  his  social  intercourse. 

Besides  the  three  great  works  which  have  been 
particularly   mentioned,   Lieber   wrote    many   other 


31 

things  of  great  value,  among  the  principal  of  which 
may  be  mentioned  "The  Origin  and  Development  of 
the  First  Constituents  of  Civilization;"  "Great 
Events  described  by  Great  Historians ;"  "  Essays 
upon  Property  and  Labor ;"  "  The  Laws  of  Pro 
perty  ;"  "  Penal  Laws  and  the  Penitentiary  System ;"  V 
"On  Prison  Discipline;"  "The  Relation  between 
Education  and  Crime;"  "The  Pardoning  Power;" 
"  International  Copyright ;"  "  The  Character  of  the 
Gentleman ;"  "  The  Study  of  Latin  and  Greek  as 
Elements  of  Education;"  on  "Laura  Bridgman's 
Vocal  Sounds ;"  on  "  Anglican  and  Gallican  Liberty" 
(translated  into  German  with  many  notes  and  addi 
tions  by  Privy  Counsellor  Mittermaier) ;  on  the 
"Post-Office  and  Postal  Reforms ;"  on  the  "  Indepen 
dence  of  the  Judiciary ;"  on  "  Two  Houses  of  Legis 
lature,"  and  a  very  large  number  of  minor  tracts  and 
publications.1 

Of  "Property  and  Labor,"  Professor  Greenleaf 
wrote,  in  October  1842 :  "  The  feature  of  your  book 
which  strikes  me  most  strongly  is  the  strong  common 
sense  and  sound  reason  manifested  in  regard  to  the 
origin  of  property ;  brushing  away  at  a  stroke  the 
cobweb  theories  of  previous  tenancy  in  common  and 
of  social  compact.  To  me  all  the  theories  I  had 

V 

1  He  wrote  many  able  articles  on  public  questions  which  appeared  in  the 
New  York  Evening  Post  over  the  signature  "  Americus."  The  last  one  he 
ever  wrote  appeared  in  that  Journal,  Sept.  24,  1872,  and  was  entitled  "  Ke- 
ligion  and  Law."  He  also  contributed  many  valuable  papers  to  the  "  Revue 
de  Droit  International."  M.  Rolin-Jaequemyns,  the  learned  editor  of  that 
revieAv  has,  in  a  recent  number,  paid  a  very  eloquent  and  affectionate  tribute 
to  the  memory  of  Lieber. 


32 

previously  met  with  upon  the  original  title  to  indi 
vidual  property  appeared  visionary  and  unsound. 
But  you  have  spoken  directly  to  my  understanding 
and  borne  me  along  with  you,  my  mind  joyously 
assenting  to  each  successive  step  in  the  induction." 

In  1844  Lieber  visited  his  native  city  of  Berlin. 
He  had  an  interview  with  the  king,  Frederic  Wil 
liam  IY.  who  received  him  very  cordially,  and 
insisted  that  he  must  now  remain  in  Prussia.  "  We 
must  do  something"  said  the  king,  "to  keep  you 
here,  you  must  not  be  lost  to  us."  He  was  accord 
ingly  offered  a  new  professorship  of  Poenology  in 
the  University  of  Berlin,  with  the  inspectorship  of 
all  the  prisons  in  the  kingdom.  But  neither  the 
request  of  the  king  nor  the  friendship  of  Humboldt 
could  overcome  his  preference  for  the  land  of  his 
adoption.  His  memory,  however,  recalled  in  singular 
contrast  with  the  honors  then  bestowed  upon  him  the 
political  persecution  which  compelled  him  who  had 
in  his  youth  borne  arms  for  his  country  and  bled  in 
her  cause,  to  steal  away  by  stealth  from  his  native 
land. 

In  December  1856  Doctor  Lieber  resigned  his 
professorship  in  South  Carolina  College.  The  reso 
lutions  adopted  by  the  alumni  of  that  institution 
and  conveyed  to  him  by  their  committee,  Wm.  C. 
Preston,  Gov.  Manning,  Jas.  L.  Pettigru,  Richard 
Yeadon,  J.  H.  Hudson,  and  Jos.  B.  Allston 
attest  their  profound  regret  and  their  sense  of  the 
loss  which  that  institution  suffered  by  his  departure. 


33 

In  1857  he  was  elected  to  a  similar  professorship  in 
Columbia  College,  [NTew  York,  and  subsequently  to 
the  chair  of  political  science  in  the  Law  School  of 
the  same  institution.  He  continued  in  the  discharge 
of  the  duties  of  that  position  to  the  time  of  his 
death,  which  occurred  at  his  house  in  New  York,  on 
the  afternoon  of  the  2d  October  1872.  His  habits 
of  industry  continued  until  the  close  of  his  life.  He 
was  engaged,  at  the  time  of  his  death,  in  writing  a 
work  upon  the  Rise  of  the  Constitution,  and  had  so 
far  progressed  in  it  as  to  insure,  it  is  hoped,  its 
publication ;  for  it  cannot  but  prove  a  most  valuable 
addition  to  that  department  of  the  law.  I  may 
state  here,  in  passing,  that  he  wrote  the  article  "  Con 
stitution"  in  Bouvier's  Law  Dictionary.  During 
the  period  of  his  connection  with  the  Law  School  of 
Columbia  College  his  writings  upon  various  sub 
jects  were  too  numerous  to  receive  a  detailed  notice 
here.  They  were  upon  a  great  variety  of  subjects, 
and  all  of  them  displayed  the  strength  of  argument 
and  wonderful  power  of  illustration  which  charac 
terize  all  his  works.  The  general  character  of  his 
political  writings  is  happily  drawn  in  the  Princeton 
Review,  of  October  1858.  "  Lieber  is  a  man  who 
stands  on  the  altitudes  of  history,  and  not  on  a  mere 
political  platform.  His  work  is,  therefore,  based 
upon  the  grand  memories  of  the  past,  and  not  upon 
the  shifting  politics  of  a  day.  Most  political  writers 
have  looked  at  political  life  from  one  point  of  view 
— that  of  their  own  times.  But  Lieber  has  looked 

5 


at  it  from  every  period  presented  in  each  successive 
cycle  of  human  progress  and  has  not  only  appreci 
ated  the  results  of  the  working  of  the  various 
institutions,  but  has  noted  the  growth  and  the  muta 
tions  from  age  to  age  of  the  institutions.  In  the 
true  scientific  spirit  Lieber  brings  to  his  expositions 
//of  principles  all  the  resources  of  abstract  reasoning  ; 
well  knowing,  and,  indeed,  so  declaring,  that  all 


>j 


progress  is  founded  in  historical  development  and 
--abstract  reasoning.  /"While,  therefore,  Lieber  lights 
the  torch  of  science  atT^no  lights  but  those  of  ex 
perience,  he  adds  to  it  that  prescience  of  reason  which 
is  to  direct  the  statesman's  forecast  into  the  future." 
One  of  the  most  important  considerations  relating  to 
his  works  is  the  fact  that  he  was  a  republican,  and 
believed  in  liberty  as  organized  and  guaranteed  by  the 
institutions  of  this  country.  He,  therefore,  viewed 
political  principles  and  institutions  from  a  point 
different  from  that  occupied  by  the  great  European 
writers  upon  the  same  subjects*.. 
/  j^jQDuring  the  late  civil  war  Lieber  rendered  very 

^  valuable  service  to  the  government  and  the  country. 
He  was  one  of  the  first  to  point  out,  by  his  pen,  the 
madness  of  secession,  and  to  impress  upon  the  coun 
try  the  value  of  the  institutions  which  wera  en 
dangered.  As  early  as  1851,  in  an  address  delivered 
in  South  Carolina,  he  had  warned  the  South  of  the 
ruin  with  which  the  doctrine  of  secession  threatened 
it  and  the  whole  country.  During  the  whole  war  his 
pen  was  constantly  at  work  supporting  the  govern- 


35 

ment  and  upholding  the  Union.1  He  was  frequently 
suTn^necTTo^Washington  by  telegraph  by  the  Sec 
retary  of  war  for  consultation  and  advice  upon  the 
most  important  subjects.  His  correspondence  with 
the  secretary,  and  with  Gen.  Halleck  while  Gen- 
eral-in-chief,  is  very  voluminous.  The  Code  of 
war,  prepared  by  him  upon  the  requisition  of  the 
President  of  the  United  States,  and  promulgated  in 
general  orders  of  the  war  department,  UTo.  100, 
(1863)  as  "Instructions  for  the  government  of  the 
armies  of  the  United  States  in  the  field,"  is  one  of 
the  greatest  works  of  his  later  years.  He  thereby 
conferred  not  only  a  benefit  upon  his  own  country, 
but  added  a  new  chapter,  replete  with  noble  and 
humane  sentiments,  to  the  law  of  war.  M.  Laboulaye 
has  justly  described  these  instructions  as  a  master 
piece,  and  they  suggested  to  Blunt  schli  the  plan  of 
codifying  the  law  of  nations,  as  may  be  seen  in  his 
letter  to  Lieber,  which  serves  as  a  preface  to  his  work 
Droit  International  Codifie.  Blunt  schli  published  as 
an  appendix  to  his  Code  the  whole  of  Lieber's  In 
structions  for  the  Army.  Dr.  Lieber  used  to  call  this 
work  his  "  old  hundred." 

His  pamphlet  on  "Guerilla  Parties,  considered 
with  reference  to  the  laws  and  usages  of  War," 
written  at  the  request  of  Major-General  Halleck, 

1  He  was  president,  and  one  of  the  founders  of  the  Loyal  Publication 
Society,  in  1863,  and  wrote  some  of  its  most  popular  publications.  Among 
them  "Slavery,  Plantations,  and  the  Yeomanry  ;"  "The  Arguments  of  Se 
cessionists  ;"  "No  Party  Now,  but  All  for  our  Country;"  "Amendments 
to  the  Constitution  submitted  to  the  consideration  of  the  American  People." 


C  36  / 

was  another  important  contribution  to  the  cause  of 
his  country  and  to  the  law  of  war.  At  the  close  of 
the  war  he  was  placed  in  charge  of  the  Eebel  Ar 
chives  for  the  purpose  of  classifying  and  arranging 
them,  a  duty  which  occupied  him  for  several  months ; 
and  he  was,  at  the  time  of  his  death,  the  umpire  of  the 
commission  for  the  adjudication  of  Mexican  claims. 
Among  the  most  perfect  of  all  his  minor  writings 
at  this  period,  was  the  small  fragment  entitled 
"Nationalism,"  which  Garelli,  the  Italian  publicist 
and  author  of."  La  Pace"  calls  Vaureo  opuscolo — the 
Golden  Tract.  It  contains  within  a  very  small  com 
pass  a  greater  amount  of  political  philosophy  and 
a  more  condensed  statement  of  the  general  truths 
derived  from  historic  experience  than  was  perhaps 
ever  before  embraced  within  the  same  space.  It 
j  closes  with  this  grand  thought.  "The  civilized 
nations  have  come  to  form  a  community  of  nations, 
under  the  restraint  and  protection  of  the  Law  of 
Nations,  which  rules  vigore  divino. — They  draw  the 
chariot  of  civilization  abreast,  as  the  ancient  steeds 
drew  the  car  of  victory." 

7~ America  owes  a  large  debt  to  Lieber.  Probably 
no  man  has  instructed  so  many  of  our  countrymen  in 
the  truths  of  history,  the  canons  of  ethics,  and  the 
Principles  of  political  science.  Nearly  forty  years  of 
I/his  life  were  spent  in  that  service,  years  crowded  also 
with  industry  in  other  departments,  and  in  which  he 
produced  those  great  works  which  will  in  the  future 
take  their  place  beside  the  most  important  which 


37 

have  appeared  in  the  history  of  jurisprudence.  His 
method  of  teaching  was  such  as  to  make  the  subject 
attractive  in  the  highest  degree  to  his  students,  and 
they  thoroughly  understood  everything  they  learned. 
He  never  read  lectures  but  expounded  his  subjects  in 
terse,  familiar  language,  and  impressed  them  by 
copious  and  happy  illustrations.  At  the  end  of 
every  recitation  he  gave  out  what  for  the  next  time 
they  ought  to  read  collaterally,  and  what  peculiar 
subjects  or  persons  they  ought  to  study,  besides  the 
lesson.  He  caused  them  to  read  poetry  and  fiction, 
in  connection  with  history,  to  see  how  great  writers 
had  conceived  great  characters.  He  relied  much 
upon  the  blackboard.  To  one  he  would  give  chro 
nology,  to  another  geography,  to  another  names,  to 
another  battles.  Four  large  blackboards  were  in 
constant  use  at  the  same  time,  and  often  a  consider 
able  part  of  the  floor  besides.  All  names  were 
required  to  be  written  down,  sometimes  sixty  or 
seventy  by  one  student,  with  a  word  or  two  showing 
that  the  writer  knew  what  they  meant.  All  places 
were  pointed  out  on  large  maps  and  globes.  All 
definitions  were  written  on  the  blackboard  in  order 
that  there  might  be  no  mistake.  Foreign  names  were 
always  written  on  the  blackboard  behind  him.  He 
always  appointed  a  lesson,  but  the  students  when  they 
came  did  not  know  whether  they  were  to  recite  or 
to  listen  to  a  lecture,  so  that  they  always  had  to  be 
prepared.  Notes  of  his  lectures  were  to  be  taken, 
and  he  required  each  student  to  have  a  blank  book, 


38 

wherein  they  must  enter  titles  of  books  and  subjects 
to  be  studied  in  later  life — such  as  were  necessary 
for  an  educated  man ;  and  he  was  particular  in  re 
quiring  this  blank  book  to  have  a  firm  cover.  He 
used  to  say  that  books  were,  like  men,  of  little  use 
without  a  stiff  back.  He  frequently  bound  books 
himself.  He  was  a  man  of  generous  mind,  and  was 
full  of  sensibility.  He  loved  his  students  and  was 
greatly  beloved  by  them.  On  one  occasion  the  com 
petitors  for  the  prize  in  his  department  of  the  law 
school  at  Columbia  College,  were  writing  their  prize 
papers  on  the  National  elements  in  our  Constitution, 
their  genesis  and  history.  For  this  purpose  they 
were  allowed  two  or  three  hours,  during  which  they 
were  obliged  to  complete  their  essays  without  assist 
ance.  At  the  end  of  the  time,  he  w^as  requested  by 
his  students  to  extend  it  for  one  of  their  number. 
"But  why?"  he  asked.  The  answer  was,  "He  was 
wounded  at  Fort  Fisher  in  the  right  arm,  and  cannot 
write  as  fast  as  we  can."  The  instructor  could  only 
nod  his  assent  and  was  obliged  to  turn  quickly  away 
to  conceal  the  emotion  which  overcame  him. 

He  was  more  than  a  mere  teacher  of  a  profound 
science.  He  embraced  every  opportunity  to  infuse 
the  noblest  sentiments  into  the  minds  of  his  pupils ; 
so  that  he  could  truly  say,  as  in  his  prefatory  address 
to  his  former  pupils  prefixed  to  his  Civil  Liberty. 
"  You  can  bear  me  witness  that  I  have  endeavored  to 
convince  you  of  man's  inextinguishable  individuality, 
and  of  the  organic  nature  of  society  ;  that  there  is  no 


39 


right  without  a  parallel  duty,  no  liberty  without  the    <£ 
supremacy  of  the  law,  and  no  high  destiny  without 
perseverance — that  there  can  he  no  greatness  without 
self-denial." 

He  was  thoroughly  American  in  all  his  feelings — 
as  much  so  as  if  he  had  been  born  here.  Few  persons 
were  so  well  acquainted  with  our  history,  or  understood 
so  well  tire  character  of  our  institutions.  Few  were  so 
well  versed  in  the  political  changes  of  this  country,  or 
knew  so  many  of  its  leading  men.  He  took  a  lively  in 
terest  in  all  public  measures,  and  followed  attentively 
the  course  of  legislation.  He  watched  with  anxiety 
every  political  crisis,  and  wrote  and  worked  for  what  he 
considered  the  right  side  of  every  question.  His  in-  \^\ 
terests  and  affections  were  bound  up  in  America.  He^ 
admired  her  institutions,  but  was  not  blind  to  their 
weak  points,  and  labored  constantly  to  strengthen 
and  improve  them.  He  often  took  an  active  part  in 
public  affairs,  but  never  sank  to  the  low  level  of  a 
partisan.  He  felt  an  interest  in  all  which  concerned 
the  welfare  of  his  country,  and  was  proud  of  all  that 
added  to  her  glory  and  her  greatness.  Yet  his  heart 
was  true  to  his  native  land,  and  when  the  great  war 
broke  out  which  ended  in  the  establishment  of  her 
supremacy  and  unity,  he  chafed  because  he  could  not 
go  to  her  assistance.  On  the  22d  of  July  1870  he  wrote, 
"  I  am  writing  at  random,  for  my  very  soul  is  filled 
with  that  one  word,  one  idea,  one  feeling — Germany. 
The  stream  of  blood  which  will  flow  will  probably 
not  be  very  long,  but  very  wide,  wide  like  a  lake,  and 


40 

very  deep."  And  again  on  the  18th  August  1870, 
"  My  German  letters  confirm  that  all  Germans  are  ani 
mated  by  the  noblest  feelings,  and  are  ready  to  sac 
rifice  money,  life,  everything,  in  defence  of  their 
country.  The  fathers  of  families,  supporting  them  by 
their  hands,  refuse  to  be  refused  until  the  king  is 
obliged  to  telegraph  '  accept  them,'  and  judges  and 
civil  officers  of  high  station  volunteer  and  join  the 
ranks.  And  I  sit  here  and  write  like  a  dullard.  It 
is  very  hard."  He  was  then  seventy  years  of  age,  but 
the  patriotic  fire  burned  as  brightly  in  his  bosom  as 
in  the  young  days  when  he  challenged  the  justice  of 
despotic  government  or  volunteered  in  the  cause  of 
Greece.  In  truth  Francis  Lieber  belonged  to  the 
whole  world.  His  thoughts  and  the  course  of  his 
studies  led  him  to  regard  nations  only  as  different 
members  of  the  same  household.  He  illustrated  in 
his  life  and  writings  the  full  force  of  the  saying  ubi 
libertas  ibi  patria.  He  hated  oppression  in  every 
place  and  under  every  form.  I  once  heard  him  say 
that  his  feelings  were  such  towards  Louis  XIV.  that 
he  did  not  know  how  he  could  possibly  speak  to  him 
if  he  met  him  in  the  next  world.  His  catholic  spirit 
overleaped  in  its  sympathies  all  geographical  lines 
and  compassed  all  men  in  its  boundless  affection  and 
solicitude.  He  regarded  all  Christian  and  civilized 
states,  as  members  of  the  same  family,  whose  inter 
course  based  upon  reciprocal  justice  and  kindness  is 
necessary  for  the  happiness  of  each,  for  "  we  are,"  as 
he  himself  said  when  speaking  of  Europe  and  Amer- 


41 

ica,  "  of  kindred  blood,  of  one  Christian  faith,  of  simi 
lar  pursuits  and  civilization,  we  have  one  science 
and  the  same  arts,  we  have  one  common  treasure  of 
knowledge  and  power.  Our  alphabet  and  numeric 
signs  are  the  same,  and  we  are  members  of  one  family 
of  advanced  nations." 

i?or  England,  next  to  his  native  land  and  his 
adopted  country,  he  had  the  greatest  admiration. 
He  called  her  a  "  royal  republic,"  as  Thomas  Arnold 
many  years  later  called  her  a  kingly  comwonwealth. 
He  had  studied  profoundly  her  constitutional  history 
and  the  development  of  her  institutions.  There  is 
no  more  eloquent  passage  in  all  his  works,  than  that 
in  the  introduction  to  his  Civil  Liberty,  in  which 
he  describes  hep  as  leading  the  van  of  nations  in  the 
dissemination  of  liberal  principles — a  passage  of  so 
much  beauty  that  I  cannot  forbear  to  quote  it  here. 


"  England  was  the  earliest  country  to  put  an  end  to  feudal 
isolation,  while  still  retaining  independent  institutions,  and  to 
unite  the  estates  into  a  powerful  general  parliament  able  to 
protect  the  nation  against  the  crown.  In  England  we  first  see 
applied  in  practice  and  on  a  grand  scale  the  idea  which  came  orig 
inally  from  the  Netherlands,  that  liberty  must  not  be  a  boon  of 
the  government,  but  must  derive  its  rights  from  the  people.  Here 
too  the  people  always  clung  to  the  right  to  tax  themselves,  and 
here  from  the  earliest  times  the  administration  of  justice  has 
been  separated  from  the  other  functions  of  government  and  de 
volved  upon  magistrates  set  apart  for  this  end — a  separation  not 
yet  found  in  all  countries.  In  England  power  of  all  kinds,  even 
of  the  crown,  has  ever  bowed,  at  least  theoretically,  to  the  supre 
macy  of  the  law,  and  that  country  may  claim  the  imperishable 
glory  of  having  formed  a  national  representative  system  of  two 
houses,  governed  by  a  parliamentary  law  of  their  own,  with  that 
important  element — at  once  conservative  and  progressive — of  a 


42 

lawful  loyal  opposition.  It  is  that  country  which  alone  saved 
judicial  and  political  publicity,  when  secresy  prevailed  everywhere 
else;  which  retained  a  self-developing  common  law  and  estab 
lished  the  trial  by  jury.  In  England  the  principles  of  self-govern 
ment  were  not  swept  away,  and  all  the  chief  principles  and  guar 
antees  of  her  great  charter  and  the  petition  of  rights  have  passed 
over  into  our  constitutions.  We  belong  to  the  Anglican  tribe 
which  carries  Anglican  principles  and  liberty  over  the  globe,  be 
cause  wherever  it  moves  liberal  institutions  and  a  common  law 
full  of  manly  rights  and  instinct  with  the  principle  of  an  expan 
sive  life  accompany  it.  We  belong  to  that  race  whose  obvious 
task  it  is,  among  other  proud  and  sacred  tasks,  to  rear  and  spread 
civil  liberty  over  vast  regions  in  every  part  of  the  earth,  on  con 
tinent  and  isle.  We  belong  to  that  tribe  which  alone  has  the  word 
self-government.  We  belong  to  that  nation  whose  great. lot  it  is  to 
be  placed  with  the  full  inheritance  of  freedom  on  the  freshest  soil, 
in  the  noblest  site,  between  Europe  and  Asia — a  nation  young, 
whose  kindred  countries,  powerful  in  wealth,  armies,  and  intellect, 
are  old.  It  is  a  period  when  a  peaceful  migration  of  nations,  sim 
ilar  in  the  weight  of  numbers  to  the  warlike  migration  of  the  early 
middle  ages,  pours  its  crowd  into  the  lap  of  our  more  favored 
land,  there  to  try,  and  at  times  to  test  to  the  utmost  our  insti 
tutions — institutions  which  are  our  foundations  and  buttresses,  as 
the  law  which  they  embody  and  organize  is  our  sole  and  sover 
eign  naaster." 


Lieber  was  extremely  fond  of  historical  as  well  as 
political  studies  and  probably  no  man  in  this  country 
had  a  more  extensive  or  accurate  knowledge  of 
historical  subjects.  Not  only  was  he  acquainted  with 
their  minute  details,  but  he  explored  their  most  hidden 
recesses.  To  use  an  expression  which  was  familiar 
with  him,  he  read  history  "between  the  lines."  He 
knew  its  secret  springs  and  was  complete  master  of  its 
philosophy.  The  Historical  Society  of  Pennsylvania, 
of  which  he  was  so  long  a  member,  fitly  unites  the  ex 
pression  of  its  profound  regret  at  the  loss  of  this  great 


scholar,  jurist,  and  philosopher,  with  those  which  pro 
ceed  from  the  whole  world  of  science  and  of  letters.  j/ 

Of  his  personal  habits,  sentiments,  and  peculiarities  fyv^* 
I  may  add  a  few  words.  He  was  a  firm  believer  in 
the  Christian  religion.  His  life  was  pure  and  con 
formed  to  its  precepts.  He  was  a  Protestant  and 
zealous  defender  of  religious  as  well  as  civil  libertyj 
Nothing  roused  his  indignation  more  than  any  al 
tempt,  proceeding  from  whatever  quarter,  to  coerce 
men's  consciences.  Referring  in  one  of  his  letters  to 
the  fact  that  in  the  first  quarter  of  this  century,  Fer 
dinand  VII.  through  the  influence  of  the  Spanish 
priesthood,  had  abolished  the  chairs  of  natural  phi 
losophy  in  the  University  of  Salamanca,  because  the 
study  of  those  sciences  led  to  infidelity,  he  exclaims, 
"  A  fine  God  that  of  those  priests ;  whether  you  ap 
proach  him  by  reading  the  Bible  or  by  reading  Na 
ture  you  are  alike  led  to  atheism.  O  God  of  Truth, 
how  long?  how  long?"  There  was  nothing  which 
he  abhorred  so  much  as  tyranny,  and  none  whom  he 
hated  so  much  as  tyrants.  Of  Louis  Napoleon  he 
said  "His  success  has  been  owing  to  his  being 
entirely  untrammelled  by  conscience  or  honor,  to  his 
unlimited  arrogance  and  his  perfect  freedom  from 
shame." 

A       In  his  views  of  the  Constitution  he  was  eminently-* 
national.     He  adopted  the  views  of  Hamilton  and 
Madison.     He  hated  the  doctrine  of  state-rights  (in 
the   political    sense    in   which   it   is    commonly   re 
ceived),  which  he  looked  upon  as  the  dry  rot  in  the 


44 

ship  of  state.  He  believed  the  United  States  to  be 
a  nation  and  not  a  league  of  states.1  He  was  opposed 
to  that  nice  and  strict  construction  of  the  constitution 
which  would  deprive  the  national  government  of  its 
vigor  and  its  unity.  At  the  same  time  he  defended 
the  right  of  local  self-government  in  all  matters  re 
lating  properly  to  the  people  of  the  several  States. 
He  was  opposed  to  all  efforts  to  confuse  the  bound 
aries  which  define  the  just  limits  of  State  and  National 
authority.  He  was  extremely  hostile  to  a  tariff,  and 
a  firm  believer  in  free-trade,  of  which  he  was  one  of 
the  most  able  champions,  and  to  the  defence  of  which 
he  devoted  many  of  his  hours,  writing  many  pam 
phlets  and  articles  in  support  of  his  views. 

He  had  very  little  time  to  devote  to  the  natural 
sciences,  for  his  studies  lay  in  other  directions,  but 
he  was  well  acquainted  with  their  history  and  princi 
pal  facts  and  theories,  and  with  the  lives  of  the  great 
men  eminent  in  those  pursuits.  He  thoroughly  de 
spised  the  Darwinian  theory  of  natural  selection  and 
development,  and  always  spoke  of  it  as  Darwin's  beast 
humanity.  "When  great  truths  impressed  them 
selves  upon  his  mind  he  was  in  the  habit  of  formu 
lating  them  in  a  few  weighty  words.  Thus  in  treating 
of  the  relationship  of  right  and  duty,  he  showed  the 
intercompleting  relation  of  the  two,  and  the  fatal  mis 
take  of  supposing  that  liberty  consisted  in  rights  alone, 
and  expressed  it  in  the  aphorism  Nullum  jus  sine 

1  See  his  powerful  argument  in  the  pamphlet  entitled  "  What  is  our  Con 
stitution — League,  Pact  or  Government  ?"  1861. 


officio  nullum  officium  sine  jure.  No  right  without  its 
duties,  no  duty  without  its  rights ;  and  this  motto  he 
had  engraved  at  the  top  of  his  letters  for  many  years 
before  his  death. 

He  was  jealous  of  his  fame  and  greatly  gratified 
when  his  works  were  appreciated.  He  did  not  dis 
guise  the  pleasure  he  felt  upon  one  occasion  at  hear 
ing  that  a  set  of  his  works  had  been  ordered  from 
Australia.  In  one  of  his  letters  he  speaks  of  the 
pleasure  with  which  he  had  just  read  one  of  his  earlier 
productions  written  thirty  years  before,  and  immedi 
ately  apologizes  for  his  self-admiration  by  telling 
the  following  story :  "  I  once  stood  with  the  famous 
Mrs.  Herz,  the  Platonic  friend  and  student  of  Schleir- 
macher,  when  she  was  quite  old,  before  her  own  por 
trait  taken  when  she  was  young.  She  looked  silent 
ly  at  the  picture  for  some  time,  and  then  said  '  she 
was  very  beautiful.'  I  was  young  then,  but  just  re 
turned  from  Greece  and  Rome  and  Niebuhr.  The 
waves  of  my  soul  were  short  and  boiling,  and  this 
saying  touched  me  much." 

He  was  a  great  lover  of  the  fine  arts.  "  What,'7  he 
once  wrote,  "  will  become  of  the  world  when  there 
will  be  no  Raphael,  no  Apollo  Belvidere,  no  Angelo 
— and  that  time  will  come."  He  took  great  delight 
in  nature.  A  flower,  even  a  leaf  sometimes  gave  him 
the  greatest  pleasure.  He  was  very  fond  of  little 
children  and  their  sayings.  In  recent  letters  which 
passed  between  himself  and  the  poet  Longfellow  these 
two  communicated  to  each  other  the  sayings  of  some 


46 

little  children.  Children  loved  him,  and  in  the  cars 
and  other  places  he  would  constantly  make  acquain 
tance  with  them  and  relate  their  sayings  when  he 
came  home.  He  disliked  all  slang  expressions  and 
had  an  especial  contempt  for  the  common  expression 
"a  self-made  man."  A  man  once  said  to  him,  "  Sir,  I 
am  a  self-made  man."  " Indeed !"  replied  Lieber,  "what 
a  pity  I  was  not  present.  I  have  long  wished  to  be 
present  when  a  man  was  making  himself."  He  was 
very  fond  of  fine  and  delicate  perfumes,  and  used  to 
say  it  was  his  only  extravagance.  He  would  often 
bring  home  little  boxes  filled  with  Lubin's  violet,  in 
which  he  particularly  delighted.  A  little  bottle  stood 
in  every  room  in  which  he  habitually  came. 

It  was  his  habit  in  reading  or  studying  to  use  a 
great  number  of  book-marks.  These  consisted  of 
narrow  strips  of  pasteboard,  upon  each  one  of  which 
was  usually  written  some  important  historical  date, 
some  pregnant  maxim,  or  some  weighty  saying.  He 
was  exceedingly  industrious,  as  may  be  easily  seen  in 
the  great  number  and  variety  of  his  productions. 
His  table  and  every  chair  in  the  room  were  always 
covered  with  books  and  papers.  He  was  very  seldom 
idle.  At  one  period  of  his  student  life  in  Germany 
he  allowed  himself  only  four  hours  of  sleep,  and  his 
food  at  that  period  often  consisted  of  nothing  but 
bread  and  apples.  "While  in  South  Carolina  it  was 
his  habit  to  write  at  his  books  until  one  o'clock  and 
often  later  in  the  night,  and  afterwards  to  rise  early 
enough  to  be  in  his  class-room  and  deliver  his  lee- 


47 

ture  from  7  to  8  o'clock ;  always  preferring  that  hour 
that  he  might  have  more  time  during  the  day  for 
his  own  work.  Over  the  door  of  his  house  in  New 
York  he  had  placed  "Die  Studirende  Eule" — the 
owl  studying ;  and  on  the  ceiling  were  painted  these 

words 

Patria  Cara 
Carior  Libertas 
"Veritas  Carissima. 

Over  the  door  of  his  library  hung  the  panel  o 
saved  from  the  fire  which  destroyed  the  chapel  of 
South  Carolina  College,  on  which  he  had  painted 
the  saying  of  Socrates  XAAEIIA  TA  KAAA — all  noble 
things  are  difficult.  On  the  seal,  which  he  adopted 
in  his  youth  were  the  words  Perfer  et  Sperne.  In  his 
library  hung  what  he  called  his  Stella  duplex — 
William  of  Orange  and  Washington,  engravings  of 
whom  he  had  arranged  and  framed  upon  one  card, 
with,  on  one  side,  the  motto  of  "William  of  Orange 
Scevis  tranquillus  in  undis,  and  on  the  other  (Wash 
ington  having  no  motto  of  his  own)  Tenax  et  Integer. 
Another  Stella  duplex  similarly  arranged  contained 
the  likenesses  of  Hampden  and  Pym :  above  them 
the  words  Nulla  vestigia  retrorswm,  and  underneath — 

MDCXL. 

Claris  Civibus 
Probis  et  audacibus 
Heres  grains  et  compos 
Libertatis  expugnatce 
Et  defensor. 


48 

In  his  bed-room  he  had  busts  of  Plato,  Schiller  and 
Alexander  Hamilton,  whom  he  greatly  admired,  and 
over  the  mantel-piece  his  favorite — Hugo  Grotius. 

He  was  very  fond  of  poetry,  and  when  those  who 
loved  him  came,  after  his  death,  to  examine  his  papers 
they  found  scattered  everywhere  through  his  jour 
nals,  on  scraps  of  papers,  and  on  packages  of  weigh 
tier  matters,  some  little  poem,  some  great  thought, 
some  beautiful  sentiment.  His  correspondence  was 
very  extensive,  embracing  many  of  the  most  distin 
guished  men  of  this  country  and  abroad,  Humboldt, 
Niebuhr,  Bunsen,  Mittermaier,Laboulaye,  Bluntschli, 
Heffter,  Von  Holzendorff,  De  Tocqueville,  Rolin-Jae- 
quemyns,  Pierantoni,  and  many  others  renowned  in 
letters  and  science.  He  enjoyed  the  sprightly  letters 
of  bright  and  refined  women  and  they  were  always 
deeply  interested  in  him.  His  own  letters,  like  his 
conversation,  charmed  every  one  with  the  humor  with 
which  they  abounded,  and  the  instruction  which  they 
conveyed.  (His  disposition  was  happy  and  cheerful, 
but  at  times,  especially  when  during  the  war  pnblic 
calamaties  seemed  to  threaten  his  country — clouded 
by  an  indescribable  sadness.  From  his  earliest  years 
he  formed  strong  attachments.  He  had  the  most  de 
voted  friends.  His  love  for  his  mother  was  most 
touching,  and  his  domestic  life  was  beautiful  in  its 
simplicity  and  devotion.  As  one  who  knew  him  best 
and  loved  him  most  has  truly  said  "  few  men  com 
bined  so  much  greatness  and  power  with  so  much 
loveliness." 


49 

His  death  was  very  sudden  and  was  caused  by  an 
affection  of  the  heart.  He  had  been  unwell  for  a  day 
or  two  and  remained  at  home.  His  wife  was  reading 
to  him.  It  was  her  constant  habit  to  do  so  and  was 
one  of  the  greatest  enjoyments  of  his  life.  He  inter 
rupted  the  reading  with  an  expression  of  pain  and 
almost  immediately  expired.  He  was  in  the  seventy- 
third  year  of  his  age. 

Doctor  Lieber  was  married  on  the  21st  Sept.  1829, 
and  left  at  his  death  a  widow  and  two  sons.  Captain 
Hamilton  Lieber  and  Major  ]STorman  Lieber,  both  of 
them  officers  in  the  Army  of  the  United  States. 

Nature  gave  to  Francis  Lieber  a  robust  frame. 
He  was  short  in  stature,  compact  and  muscular.  In 
his  younger  days  noted  for  his  strength.  His  head 
was  massive.  His  eyes  deep-set,  beneath  a  brow 
broad  and  noble.  His  countenance  indicated  the 
thoughtful  repose  and  conscious  power  of  a  great 
mind. 

[Thus  have  I  -endeavored  with  a  feeble  hand  to  de 
lineate  the  character  of  a  great  man,  conspicuous 
alike  for  his  patriotism  and  attainments ;  whose 
writings  impressed  his  thoughts  indelibly  upon  the 
ago,  and  like  those  of  Grotius  and  Montesquieu  con 
stitute  a  distinct  landmark  in  the  history  of  public 
law  and  political  science.  A  man  whose  learning 
and  intellectual  power  have  conferred  honor  upon 
our  country,  and  whose  usefulness  as  a  citizen  has 
merited  its  gratitude.  If  my  ability  had  been  equal 
to  my  love  and  reverence  for  his  memory,  the  picture 

4  . 


50 

would  have  been  more  worthy  of  him  and  would  have 
better  portrayed  his  noble  qualities.  But  his  im 
perishable  works  are  his  best  memorial,  and  his  fame 
will  be  secure  in  the  lap  of  history ;  for  as  he  himself 
said,  at  the  unveiling  of  the  Statue  of  Humboldt, 
quoting  the  grand  words  of  Pericles,  "  r±  IE  WHOLE 
EARTH  is  THE  MONUMENT  OF  ILLUSTRIOUS  MEN." 


— The  death  of  Doctor  Lieber,  on  the  afternoon  of  the  2d  inst.,  at 
the  age  of  seventy-tw.o  years,  was  the  close  of  a  checkered  as  well  as  a 
distinguished  career^/  He- witnessed  the  humiliation  of  his  country  at  Jena, 
and  helped  to  revenge  her  in  the  Hundred  Days,  and  he  saw  her  completed 
triumph  over  the  hated  enemy  at  Hetz  aud  Sedan.  Born  in  1800,  he  was  at 
the  age  of  fifteen  a  soldier  of  the  German  army  of  invasion,  and  was  wounded 
at  Namur.  He  used  to  relate  an  anecdote  of  the  field  of  "Waterloo,  which 
illustrates  his  strong  "sense,  his  pugnaoity,  and  his  dogged  self-reliance.  See 
ing,  as  the  time  for  engaging  the  enemy  came  on,  that  some  of  his  companions 
superstitiously  threw  away  their  packs  of  cards,  aud  being  angered  at  this 
weakness,  he,  though  no  card-player,  picked  up  one  of  the  packs  and  put  it 
into  his  knapsack.  A  youth  like  this  may  be  supposed  to  have  had  views  of 
rights  and  duties  not  precisely  in  accord  with  those  of  the  Holy  Alliance, 
and  we  find  him  uuder  arrest  before  he  was  twenty-one  years  old  as  sus 
pected  of  sedition.  Disgusted,  he  sought  Greece  aud  the  revolution,  reach 
ing  his  goal  by  taking  certain  liberties  with  his  passports,  and  having  on  his 
arrivarhardly  a  farthing  in  his  pocket.  IsTo  fighting,  no  glory  or  money, 
was  then  obtainable.  Young  Lieber  saon  made  his  way  back  as  far  as  Italy, 
where  JSTiebuhr,  then  Ambassador  to  the  Vatican,  and  the  Chevalier  Bunsen 
befriended  him  and  made  him  a  friend.  He  has  pleasantly  recorded  his  re 
collection  of  the  great  historian,  in  a  wo;-k  published  later,  in  this  country. 
From  Italy  he  went  to  Germany  again  ;  thence,  being  again  "  suspect,"  to 
England,  where  he  taught  private  pupils  and  wrote  for  German  periodical 
publications;  thence,  at  the  age  of  twenty-seven,  to  this  country.  Here  he 
made  friends,  lectured,  taught  school,  gave  instruction  in  swimming,  for  he 
believed  in  physical  education  alsa;  mad?  an  "  Encyclopaedia  Americana" 
(based upon  Brockhaus's  "  Conversations-  Lexicon  "),  which  was  of  very  good 
service ;  wrote  many  volumes  on  numerous  social  subjects  and  matters  of 
jurisprudence,  and  law,  and  political  philosophy;  became  a  professor  in  the 
South  Carolina  College  ;  lost  that  place  on  account  of  his  loyalty,  which  was 
unflinching,  aud,  finally,  was  appointed  to  a  professorship  in  Columbia  Law 
School  in  this  city.  This  position,  which  he  received  in  1858,  he  held  at  the 
hour  of  his  death. 

— The  subject  to  which  Dr.  Lieber's  writings  were  chiefly  devoted — a 
knowledge  of  the  principles  or  universal  rules  which  ought  to  prevail  in 

government,  general  law,  and  politics — is  a  department  of  knowledge  associ 
ated  with  the  names  of  Aristotle,  Plato,  and  Montesquieu.  It  is  one  for  which 
the  writer  must  have  not  only  an  especial  aptitude,  but  which,  at  the  present 
day,  demands  a  vast  extent  of  knowledge  and  years  of  laborious  application 
before  anything  can  be  produced  to  which  the  world  will  attach  a  permanent 
value.  The  writers  in  this  department  have  been  many.  Those  who  bave 
attained  distinction  have  been  few,  and  Dr.  Lieber  may  fairly  be  considered 
one  of  the  number.  The  volumes  upon  which  his  reputation  as  a  publicist 
will  chiefly  rest  are  his  "  Manual  of  Political  Ethics,"  "Legal  and  Political 
Hermeneutics  ;  or,  The  Principles  of  Interpretation  and  Construction  in  Law 
and  Politics  "  ;  and  his  "  Civil  Liberty  and  Self-Government "  ;  in  addition  to 
which  he  has  written  numerous  tracts,  such  as  "  The  Origin  and  Development 
of  the  First  Constituents  of  Civilization,"  essays  upon  "  Property  and  Labor," 
"  The  Laws  of  Property,"  "  Penal  Laws,"  "  Penitentiary  Systems,"  "  Prison 
Discipline,"  "  The  Kelation  between  Education  and  Crime,"  ''The  Pardoning 
Power,"  "  The  Regulation  of  Armies,"  "International  Copyright,"  "Ifatiou- 
ality  and  Intel-nationality,"  etc.,  etc.,  etc.  It  would  be  impossible  within 
our  limits  to  speak  adequately  of  works  embracing  so  wide  a  range,  and 
upon  subjects  so  important.  Among  them,  his  "Manual  of  Political  Ethics," 
a  work  in  two  volumes,  is  one  of  the  most  remarkable  and  valuable.  It  is  a 
storehouse  of  political  wisdom,  embracing  a  great  variety  of  topics  upon 
which  the  conclusions  of  the  writer  are  given,  and  is  distinguished  for  its 
profoundness,  originality,  and  its  exhaustive  treatment  of  one  of  the  most 
difficult  of  subjects.  Chancellor  Kent  commends  it  for  its  erudition  and  the 
excellence  of  its  doctrines ;  Judge  Story  for  its  sound  common  sense,  varied 
learning,  and  profound  views  of  government.  By  English  critics  it  was  com- 


pared  favorably  with  the  great  work  of  Montesquieu,  and  regarded  as  pre-emi 
nent  among  works  on  political  science.  Professor  Greenleaf,  a  very  com 
petent  judge,  speaks  of  "The  Legal  and  Political  Hermeneutics  "  as  a  most 
lucid  exposition  of  the  principles  and  admirable  illustration  of  the  science  of 
interpretation  and  construction,  and  says  in  respect  to  Lieber's  writings 
generally,  that  he  always  leaps  into  the  deepest  water,  and  always  comes  up 
like  a  good  swimmer — an  observation  borne  out  by  the  remark  of  Chancellor 
Kent,  that  when  he  read  Lieber's  books  he  always  felt  that  he  had  a  sure 
pilot  on  board,  however  dangerous  the  navigation.  There  was  something 
more  in  this  than  mere  compliment,  for  many  of  the  topics  discussed  in  the 
"  Political  Ethics  "  were  at  the  time  new,  doubtful,  and  difficult ;  and  Liebcr 
lived  to  find  conclusions  which  he  had  arrived  at,  and  was  the  first  to  express 
thirty  years  ago,  referred  to  by  writers  of  the  present  day  as  familiar  politi 
cal  truths,  without  perhaps  any  conception  on  the  part  of  the  writer  of  the 
source  whence  they  were  derived.  His  "  Civil  Liberty  and  Self-Gov 
ernment  •''  was  written  to  complete  that  portion  of  his  "  Political  Ethics  " 
which  treats  of  liberty  as  a  political  right,  the  security  of  which  depends 
upon  civil  institutions,  or,  as  he  denominates  it,  "  institutional  liberty." 
This  is  perhaps  the  best-known  of  his  [productions,  and  has  received  the 
highest  commendation  not  only  in  this  country,  where  his  reputation  never 
stood  sufficiently  high,  although  the  war  made  his  name  and  his  patriotism 
known  to  his  countrymen,  but  in  Europe  also.  Professor  Creasy  of  London, 
author  of  "The  Rise  and  Progress  of  the  British  Constitution,"  calls  it  a 
great  work,  and  publicists  on  the  Continent  like  Yon  Hohl  and  Mittermaier 
confirm  that  judgment.  One  other  foreign  judgment  of  him  as  a  publicist 
may  be  added,  that  of  Garelli,  the  eminent  Italian  jurist,  author  of  "La 
Pace/'  who  calls  Lieber's  pamphlet  on  "  Nationality  "  I'aureo  opuscolo — 
the  Golden  Tractate.  A  writer  upon  such  weighty  topics  can  scarcely  hops 
to  be  appreciated  during  his  life.  He  must  be  content  to  abide  the  slow 
judgment  of  posterity,  and  Lieber,  who,  from  his  childhood,  was  of  a  sensi 
tive  organization,  felt  this  want  of  appreciation,  especially  in  his  old  age,  and 
particularly  in  this  country,  to  the  exposition  of  whose  institutions  the  chief 
labor  of  his  life  may  be  said  to  have  been  devoted.  He  could  not,  and 
would  not  if  he  could,  write  a  brilliant,  superficial,  and  attractive  work  like 
De  Tocqueville's  "  Democracy  in  America/'  for  the  aim  of  his  writings  was 
not  speculative  thought  but  utility.  In  the  treatment  of  bis  subjects  he  was 
eminently  practical.  "With  his  strong  common  sense  and  conscientious 
honesty,  he  was  enabled  to  dispel  the  visionary  dreams  of  many  previous  po 
litical  writers,  and  to  reach  political  truths  which  rest  upon  a  sure  and  solid 
i  foundation.  He  had  great  breadth  and  comprehensiveness,  and,  as  a  writer, 
I  was  lucid  and  axiomatic,  but  lacked  constructiveness,  or  the  power  of  judi 
ciously  arranging  and  treating  a  subject,  and  treating  of  it  in  its  appropriate 
parts.  This  may  account  for  the  fact  that  his  "  Political  Ethics''  has  attracted 
so  little  attention  in  the  United  States,  for  it  is  only  those  who  have  care 
fully  perused  and  studied  it  who  can  duly  appreciate  the  extent  of  his 
erudition,  or  the  value  and  importance  of  his  views.  He  was  not  very  suc 
cessful  in  definitions.  His  power  as  a  writer  lay  in  making  things  plain  by 
illustrations,  and,  throughout  his  volumes,  what  was  new  and  obscure,  or 
difficult,  is  made  at  once  palpable  by  some  homely  image,  or  by  a  felicitous 

reference  to  some  historical  anecdote  or  incident.  His  value  to  us  was  the 
greater,  as  he  was  one- of  the  few  publicists  who  believed  in  republican  gov 
ernment  ;  who  had  an  equally  clear  insight  into  its  merits  and  its  defects ; 
who,  for  forty-three  years,  had  been  a  keen  observer  of  its  practical  working 
in  this  country  ;  and  who  was  able  to  write  upon  it  with  a  breadth  of  view 
and  an  extent  of  knowledge  that  commanded  attention  and  respect, 
rank  as  a  writer  will  be  that  of  a  political  moralist  of  weight  and  authority, 
and  as  an  expounder  alike  of  the  true  nature  of  political  liberty  and  of  the 
way  to  secure  it;  and  it  is  gratifying  to  be  able  to  say  that  his  life  was 
throughout  in  consonance  with  his  teachings. 


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